Saturday
Pulling back into Bong on Saturday, we noticed the signage out front welcomed our LDRS event!
The morning rain provided a nice opportunity to prep a rocket or two. As the skies began to clear mid-morning, we loaded my second oldest high power rocket,
Hot Topic, on the pad.
Hot Topic is 23 years old, constructed of Yank Enterprises (now Loc 3.0) parts. Though I had originally planned to fly it with airstarts, plans changed with the lower ceiling, and the 23rd flight of Hot Topic was on a single Aerotech K2050 Super Thunder.
Charlie Savoie was on the mic at LCO for one of our mutual favorite motors... love Super Thunder! While on the pad, the tracker stopped transmitting. I wasn't worried however because the winds were low, reportedly parallel with the runway, and the rocket was aimed away from the evil trees. At ignition, the old girl kicked right despite the rail angle.
Uh-oh. Sure enough, Hot Topic, with its dead tracker, was headed for the thickest parts of Viet-Bong.
Without thinking twice, Tom Maulsby volunteered to help me in the search. It took us quite a while searching through nastiness before I heard faint beeps of Missileworks altimeters! One time I was actually thankful that a rocket of mine was treed! Even after hearing the beeps, it took me another 5 minutes or so to actually locate the bird. Whew, that was some nasty recovery area! Many thanks to Tom for jumping in and helping me recover one of my sentimental favorites!
Meanwhile, dad Tom did a better job keeping his Patriot out of the trees than I did!
Back in the pits, it was time to assess the damage to my legs. Smart people wear pants to Bong in the summer...I'm not so smart sometimes!
The rest of Saturday was devoted to getting our group project airborne. This project came together pretty quickly in the waning moments leading up to LDRS 41; requiring final fit and finish on the field.
Josh Anderson and Ben Murdock saved the day when we had issues with getting the Altus Metrum units up and running. Here, Josh is listening for beeps.
How many rocketeers does it take to get a pair of altimeter/trackers to talk to ground control? I am amused...
Once we had all the right blinky, beepy, and flashy things, the crew retreated to the safe area. Stellar crew!!! There are a few in the cab as well!
Ignition!
Climbing out on the new Aerotech N4000W. Outstanding motor, Gary!
The big Goblin leapt off the pad and climbed to over 8000'. Dual deploy worked as expected, and descent was nominal ...
....except the GPS shut off after apogee and the Goblin was headed back toward the farm/corn/trees to the south of the range.
So we started looking at the corner of the field which seemed to be waypoint #1 for all recoveries I was involved with on that side of the trees. Josh, Ben, and Brandon begin the search. Ironically, we were very close at this point...Josh is probably looking at it, but it landed on the backside of a very tall tree impeding our ability to see it. After driving around the area, practicing my spanish with a few workers, we honed in on this general area once again. Eventually, coming in from the east, the main chute was spotted in the tallest tree in the area along the creek that borders Bong.
Running late for our evening activities, we left the Goblin resting overnight in it's treehouse around 6pm.