New EMRR Virtual Contest

[chanstevens]

Originally posted by BobCox

3) The new engine selector is smarter than version 7, but in some cases it is too smart. I had a heck of a time getting it to allow me to set the delay time on the K motors. It always wanted to choose "all" or "none". When I typed in a delay, it over-wrote it.

Yeah, I simmed everything using deploy at apogee event setting, then figured out if you TYPE the delay value on the lower left portion of the selector screen instead of SELECTING one it will accept any value. Same trick doesn't work on the main simulation screen where you can "tweak" existing motor selections by changing delays and/or overhangs--that only takes drop-down list values.

I was cussin' out poor Clyde on that rule--if we're using electronics, why the heck can't we deploy at apogee? Somehow, though, I was able to get lower deployment velocities spec'ing the delay instead of deploying at apogee...

Curse you and your 300 million, Bob. I kept adding length until I saw the score decline. I only had time to mess with one extreme, so guessed the fattest design might work. Sounds like the skinny boys will rule this one--definitely lower drag/faster off the pad. I tried hybrids, but couldn't get enough spike at higher weights to make much difference, and they tended to do poorly in the efficiency event on my design. Maybe I should have gone with a couple thousand MMX's, and your other favorite--the A10.

 

[afterburner]

Originally posted by EMRR
My e-mail address changed... that's why. I'm also not getting TRF updates..... again!

Please e-mail me:
input AT
rocketreviews DOT
com

Nick

Description of the entries and event #1 results are headed your way... Let me know if you don't see them soon.


Claude

 

[EMRR]

First event results are up....

Nick

 

[chanstevens]

OK, this would wind up hurting me rather than helping, but aren't the event points supposed to be something like 10 for first, 7 for second, etc. rather than the traditional inverse rank 11,10,9 etc.? In other words, a first place event finish should have put Bob more than a point ahead of the pack.

Also, any chance I can get the graphics added back on my design? That would go a long way towards explaining the name of my rocket...

 

[PunkRocketScience]

Ewww... my graphics are missing as well... Not pretty in teal...

Well, half way through the pack isn't too bad against those giant cargo monsters. I have to admit that I considered that tack as well...but to the extreme! I was thinking of making a 494 ft. tall rocket! That way all I'd have to do was clear the tower and deploy to get closest to 500 ft.!

 

[chanstevens]

Originally posted by PunkRocketScience
Ewww... my graphics are missing as well... Not pretty in teal...

Well, half way through the pack isn't too bad against those giant cargo monsters. I have to admit that I considered that tack as well...but to the extreme! I was thinking of making a 494 ft. tall rocket! That way all I'd have to do was clear the tower and deploy to get closest to 500 ft.!

Interesting point--is the Rocksim altitude measured from the tip, the aft end/motor, or the center? Any Rocksim experts (Bruce) want to weigh in on that?

I'm betting if your 494 foot tal rocket cleared the rod at all, 1) you wouldn't be able to get it to stop in time to peak at 500, 2) Rocksim would only count you as 6 feet, and 3) You'd snag your chute on the rod, probably running away with the closest to the pad score.

 

[EMRR]

Originally posted by chanstevens
Also, any chance I can get the graphics added back on my design? That would go a long way towards explaining the name of my rocket...

Claude is going to send me all of the RKT's today and I will add back any of the graphics that are missing. I was not working directly from the RKT's for this initial update.

Regards,
Nick

 

[PunkRocketScience]

Cool. Thanks Nick!

 

[BobCox]

Originally posted by chanstevens
OK, this would wind up hurting me rather than helping, but aren't the event points supposed to be something like 10 for first, 7 for second, etc. rather than the traditional inverse rank 11,10,9 etc.? In other words, a first place event finish should have put Bob more than a point ahead of the pack.

Thanks for the boost, Chan. Until you pointed it out, I never noticed that the event scores were not the simple inverse ranking. I thought that this might have been a cut-and-paste leftover from the previous contest, but it is not.

Originally posted by PunkRocketScience
Ewww... my graphics are missing as well... Not pretty in teal...

I didn't have any graphics on mine, but the colors are all messed up. Mine should have a red body with yellow lightning-bolt fins; the screen capture shows a black body with fluorescent green fins.

I wonder if this is a new feature of RockSim 8. In previous releases, all parts were blue unless told otherwise. In RockSim 8, the user can select a default color for each type of part and they will be remembered. Is it possible that I am seeing Claude's default color scheme?

 

[afterburner]

Good catch, Chan.

I had not set my excel spreadsheet properly. The change has been made and the results (for all four events) sent to Nick a couple minutes ago.

I do not know what the deal is with the colors I forwarded the files to Nick, maybe they will appear differently on his computer???


Claude

 

[the freshman]

There's more to it than this, but Prometheus was the only one who knew they name of the future son of Zeus that would one day defeat him, just as Zeus had defeated Cronus. Thus, my design is "Oracle of Prometheus." Prometheus is also a symbol of those who suffer injustice.

 

[n3tjm]

Minor Correction to the name of my Entry. It's just Time Cop. The file was called 2 cause of the minor change I made (did not want to overwrite the orignial.

 

[teflonrocketry1]

Originally posted by chanstevens
Interesting point--is the Rocksim altitude measured from the tip, the aft end/motor, or the center? Any Rocksim experts (Bruce) want to weigh in on that?

I'm betting if your 494 foot tal rocket cleared the rod at all, 1) you wouldn't be able to get it to stop in time to peak at 500, 2) Rocksim would only count you as 6 feet, and 3) You'd snag your chute on the rod, probably running away with the closest to the pad score.

RockSim altitude is measured from the aft end of the rocket. The extra length doesn't get you anything extra in terms of height. A K975WW motor will only put a 495 foot long 4 inch diameter rocket about 100 feet AGL.

Looks like I didn't win this contest; glad I didn't spend too much time on my entry!

Bruce S. Levison, NAR #69055

 

[RaVen1357]

Whew!, it looks like I'll be waiting until round #3 before I get any real score.

Also, I think my rocket really looks ugly in Green and blue. Could that be fixed?

 

[PunkRocketScience]

I must say that I liked the points I had this morning versus those I have now! That is going to be a hard hole to dig out of!

 

[the freshman]

Well, that's what I get for not reading the whole Q&A. I completely missed the part about the new type of scoring! I'm certainly out of the running now.

This just occured to me, but the way the scoring is set up, it looks like the best strategy would have been to optimize completely in two events, enough to take first in each, throwing the other two to the wind. The only way to possibly beat this score would be to at least take first in the other two.

 

[chanstevens]

Originally posted by the freshman
Well, that's what I get for not reading the whole Q&A. I completely missed the part about the new type of scoring! I'm certainly out of the running now.

This just occured to me, but the way the scoring is set up, it looks like the best strategy would have been to optimize completely in two events, enough to take first in each, throwing the other two to the wind. The only way to possibly beat this score would be to at least take first in the other two.

Yep--that's the same basic thing I was trying to promote in the last contest. High rewards for excellence, which in turn should promote more high-risk strategies.

Events 1 and 2 clearly share the same objectives, and are opposed to the design objective of 4. You can do well in event 3 with just about any design, though actual performance in that event is more a factor of what random wind you get in the 0-2 range than the design (most of us probably sim'd +/- 5 feet on the altitude and under 5-8 on deployment speed). Given that, it's clearly best to go for broke on 1 and 2, cross your fingers in 3, and hope the lead holds up on #4.

With Bob having beaten me in 1, and his claim of 300,000,000 on event 2 to my estimated 200,000,000, I know I'm already beat. Now I know to pay more attention to the component mass. I had the right design idea, but horribly inefficient weights on my material choices. I made a few simple changes last night and took over 30% of my weight out.

--Chan Stevens

 

[EMRR]

Originally posted by BobCox
I didn't have any graphics on mine, but the colors are all messed up. Mine should have a red body with yellow lightning-bolt fins; the screen capture shows a black body with fluorescent green fins.

Your's still showed up black on mine. Send me your file directly and I'll check it out.

Nick

 

[EMRR]

Originally posted by RaVen1357
Also, I think my rocket really looks ugly in Green and blue. Could that be fixed?

Please send me your file directly... and I will fix it.

Nick

 

[EMRR]

Event #2 will be posted this afternoon....

 

[EMRR]

Event #2 posted!

 

[RaVen1357]

Hey that's pretty cool, we get to see the results for event three a day early!

The link to see the detailed day 2 results actually points to the day 3 results.

And thanks for fixing my rockets picture, it looks much better now.

 

[the freshman]

Event 3 results are up under Event 2. We pretty much know who won now.

I really put mine together in a rush. Can you tell? I carefully selected my motors for the Accuracy event...forgetting to change the payload mass back from zero to 48 oz!

 

[Vanel]

I would like to see the event 2 scores - from my standing, i think I may have been the DQ

 

[EMRR]

Originally posted by the freshman
Event 3 results are up under Event 2. We pretty much know who won now.

I really put mine together in a rush. Can you tell? I carefully selected my motors for the Accuracy event...forgetting to change the payload mass back from zero to 48 oz!

Opps, fixed. and posted event 3 and comments!

Bob Cox - send me your RKT and I will fix the colors.

 

[RaVen1357]

i think I may have been the DQ

Nope, that was me. I guess that's what I get for selecting a payload that gives me a 19.99984 fps descent rate.

Oh well, my score would have been only about 36 million anyway.

 

[BobCox]

Originally posted by EMRR
Bob Cox - send me your RKT and I will fix the colors.

I've tried sending it twice, to all your addresses that I know about. Both times I got a rejection notice. What address should I send it to?

 

[chanstevens]

Somewhere earlier Nick slipped out his new (secret) address:

input at rocketreviews dot com. Replace with punctuation accordingly. Clearly, between the "encoded" email address and the "type in the number pictured in the graphic box to the right" security now enforced to submit a review to EMRR, I think someone's been smoked by span and/or web-bots...

 

[EMRR]

Originally posted by chanstevens
Somewhere earlier Nick slipped out his new (secret) address:

input at rocketreviews dot com. Replace with punctuation accordingly. Clearly, between the "encoded" email address and the "type in the number pictured in the graphic box to the right" security now enforced to submit a review to EMRR, I think someone's been smoked by span and/or web-bots...

Right. Just hit the FEEDBACK button and you can find me.

Right. Although the secret number thingy isn't working for me, however, I did stop all the porno and casio rocket review submissions with a word catcher which will not allow them to submit them.

I'm still getting banged with Dice Games, New York Textiles and Hunting Gear and some others like this.... takes the joy out of things, yet, right now it's a challenge that I'm enjoying trying to tackle...

... my last one was ROBOTs downloading my entire site so I put in place a THROTTLE to prevent x number of pings per minute. That was fun.

Oh, well....

Nick

 

[EMRR]

Final Results posted... guess who won.... again!

Nick