o1d_dude
'I battle gravity'
With all the rain out of the way and winds of 1-2 mph projected for launch day, you would think nothing could go wrong. How about some FOG?
The California Central Valley suffers from thick tule fog during the winter months and unfortunately today was apparently the first day of fog season.
At about 11:00am or so, the fog started to lift off (pun) the field and blue sky broke through. The hardy souls who were launching low and slow were finally able to bring out the big stuff and get with the program.
As the day wore on, more rocketeers and spectators showed up so even if attendance was a little below average, it was not by much.
I saw a couple of J motors go up, one a Skiddie in an old skool Polecat Aerospace Mercury 7 (?) capsule/escape tower with DD. It went way high and looked as if it was about to catch a thermal but dropped in the field about 30 yards northwest of the parked cars. There was talk of a Wildman going up on K but due to increasing drift, that never happened. A PML Black Brant went up on a small H motor for a great flight at least once. We even had three (!) Mean Machines on the field although one was still unrecovered by the end of the day. Too bad we didn't have a SuperRoc drag race.
Random occurrence of the day: A fella from LUNAR was flying with us today and blew a 29mm casing out of his rocket. About an hour later, one of our local members was walking back toward the line from a retrieval and FOUND it. The odds of that happening are apparently 100 percent. Who knew?
I brought my tube fleet and my Double Pumper Jr (my first cluster!) and flew them all. Even my High Altitude special, the CroBAR aka "Blue Thunder" which is a conventional finned bird about the size of a Big Bertha that's designed to sit on an F39. I think only the juniors flew more rockets than me today. Goes to show that it's never too late to have a happy childhood.
I took almost no pictures or video but QQUAKE2k shot these:
[YOUTUBE]_9mU7ZTq5D0[/YOUTUBE]
This is my E-Pod, a 12" tall tuber that flies on a D12-5 in this clip
Will be scary on the E30 for it was designed.
[YOUTUBE]QzdbB9OKjVc[/YOUTUBE]
My Estes Super Neon XL (minus the bogus "finlets")
Flies straight, don't it?
[YOUTUBE]HVwizD7rFZA[/YOUTUBE]
My Estes SNXL coming down on a way long recovery train
24" Top Flight nylon chute
[YOUTUBE]Wc8_wKbpBVc[/YOUTUBE]
The Double Pumper Drag Race! 2xD12-5 in each bird
[YOUTUBE]8lTZAQVc42c[/YOUTUBE]
QQUAKE2K's SlipStream with reverse fin plan on G53.
The fins stayed on!
All in all, a great day of rocket launches, short walks, and good times.
Looking forward to the next one.
PS. Please excuse typos, omissions, exaggerations, and misstatements of fact. It was a long day and I'm bushed.
The California Central Valley suffers from thick tule fog during the winter months and unfortunately today was apparently the first day of fog season.
At about 11:00am or so, the fog started to lift off (pun) the field and blue sky broke through. The hardy souls who were launching low and slow were finally able to bring out the big stuff and get with the program.
As the day wore on, more rocketeers and spectators showed up so even if attendance was a little below average, it was not by much.
I saw a couple of J motors go up, one a Skiddie in an old skool Polecat Aerospace Mercury 7 (?) capsule/escape tower with DD. It went way high and looked as if it was about to catch a thermal but dropped in the field about 30 yards northwest of the parked cars. There was talk of a Wildman going up on K but due to increasing drift, that never happened. A PML Black Brant went up on a small H motor for a great flight at least once. We even had three (!) Mean Machines on the field although one was still unrecovered by the end of the day. Too bad we didn't have a SuperRoc drag race.
Random occurrence of the day: A fella from LUNAR was flying with us today and blew a 29mm casing out of his rocket. About an hour later, one of our local members was walking back toward the line from a retrieval and FOUND it. The odds of that happening are apparently 100 percent. Who knew?
I brought my tube fleet and my Double Pumper Jr (my first cluster!) and flew them all. Even my High Altitude special, the CroBAR aka "Blue Thunder" which is a conventional finned bird about the size of a Big Bertha that's designed to sit on an F39. I think only the juniors flew more rockets than me today. Goes to show that it's never too late to have a happy childhood.
I took almost no pictures or video but QQUAKE2k shot these:
[YOUTUBE]_9mU7ZTq5D0[/YOUTUBE]
This is my E-Pod, a 12" tall tuber that flies on a D12-5 in this clip
Will be scary on the E30 for it was designed.
[YOUTUBE]QzdbB9OKjVc[/YOUTUBE]
My Estes Super Neon XL (minus the bogus "finlets")
Flies straight, don't it?
[YOUTUBE]HVwizD7rFZA[/YOUTUBE]
My Estes SNXL coming down on a way long recovery train
24" Top Flight nylon chute
[YOUTUBE]Wc8_wKbpBVc[/YOUTUBE]
The Double Pumper Drag Race! 2xD12-5 in each bird
[YOUTUBE]8lTZAQVc42c[/YOUTUBE]
QQUAKE2K's SlipStream with reverse fin plan on G53.
The fins stayed on!
All in all, a great day of rocket launches, short walks, and good times.
Looking forward to the next one.
PS. Please excuse typos, omissions, exaggerations, and misstatements of fact. It was a long day and I'm bushed.
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