AF-1 Planetary Lander

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JPVegh

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The AF-1 Planetary lander. The AF stands for air freshener. This is my interpretation of a landing vehicle using the renuzit popup air freshener.

Lander001.jpglander002.jpglander003.jpglander004.jpg


It has an 18mm mmt running through the body and an internal launch lug.
 
Nice case of salvation from the landfill. Almost looks like something from a kit.

Is the gold the actual deployable nose cone, or does the whole shell come off?

Flight report?

Overall quite clever!

Tom
 
Yes the nose cone ejects and the chute deploys out the top as any normal 3fnc at least that's the plan. The shell is glued together and the central mmt is glued to both the top and bottom. It's not yet flown but I will post a launch report after it goes up.
 
Really nice conversion Jeff! Wouldn't you know that I just sent one of these expired air fresheners out in the recycle cart this past Monday. Apple Cinnamon...

Now I have to wait for the next one to get used up.

Chas
 
You stole my idea! I thought of it over a year ago just ask Jim Flis!:roll:

Looks Great!

I'm J-E-A!
 
You stole my idea! I thought of it over a year ago just ask Jim Flis!:roll:

Looks Great!

I'm J-E-A!

Haha! Your right, I did get the idea to use the Renuzit from your post in the, "You might be a rocket geek", thread. But where you saw a nose cone I saw an airframe. I believe fyrwrx mentioned using one for a tail cone, I'm totally stealing that idea too on a future build.

Thanks for the idea!
 
Can't believe I never saw at least a nose cone when browsing the air freshener isle. Well done.
 
You could make a window on it with a couple of Coneheads looking out.

I thought about making a decal of a porthole with my ugly mug looking out but I got lazy and just printed up a sheet of stars and bars instead.
 
Jeff, what is the nose cone and tail cone made of?

I turned the nose cone on my lathe from a piece of balsa. The engine nozzle I laid out in open rocket and printed on a piece of card stock then coated it in titebond before painting it. I'll be interested to how the nozzle holds up to a launch.
 
I turned the nose cone on my lathe from a piece of balsa. The engine nozzle I laid out in open rocket and printed on a piece of card stock then coated it in titebond before painting it. I'll be interested to how the nozzle holds up to a launch.
It'll get pretty sooty on the inside, mostly from liftoff, but so long as the motor nozzle isn't recessed real far into the paper nozzle it should be okay.
 
It'll get pretty sooty on the inside, mostly from liftoff, but so long as the motor nozzle isn't recessed real far into the paper nozzle it should be okay.

Well I figure if it doesn't survive that I can make another one easy enough. Heck the whole dang rocket may not survive the first launch. Open rocket says about 0.7 calibers but I wouldn't be surprised if the shape threw it off a bit. I dont doubt that with all of that plastic and the wide bottom that it's bottom heavy. I'm counting on my wide narrow fins to pull the cp way back. First launch will be a B6-2, OR shows an early deployment at about 250'. We'll see.
 
Haha! Your right, I did get the idea to use the Renuzit from your post in the, "You might be a rocket geek", thread. But where you saw a nose cone I saw an airframe. I believe fyrwrx mentioned using one for a tail cone, I'm totally stealing that idea too on a future build.

Thanks for the idea!

Jeff, You did a great job and I'm honored for the compliment. KUTGW!
 
Well I launched this today on a B6-2. The winds were pretty high, right around 19.9 mph. The AF-1 cocked into the wind right off of the rod and and went horizontal across the field never getting more than 40 or 50 feet of altitude. The 2 second delay ejected the chute about 5 feet above the ground. The damage was limited to one broken fin and my bruised ego. The flight was stable and straight just horizontally oriented and I believe that it would have been ok had the winds been low. If I try it again I will use a four foot rod and wait for no wind. I tried to get video but the flight profile caught me off guard. I'll review the video later and post it if it looks like I got any part of the flight.
 
I gotta tell ya, THAT's A COOL LITTLE BUILD!!! Sorry I'm so late to the party--was a bit preoccupied---Don't worry about that first flight--If you did'nt find a smoking hole then it was a good day!!
 
I have a few build pics but it's not really that in depth. The fin patterns were done in general cadd, I printed up a full sheet but don't have the ability to save. I'll see what I can do about posting a scanned fin pattern or a pdf .
 
Renuzit 2.jpg
After disassembling the unit I washed it in soap and water.
renuzit 5.jpg
I measured the inside diameter of the bottom piece then laid out a centering ring pattern in general cadd and cut a centering ring from a 4 ply laminate of 110# card stock.
renuzit 11.jpg
The center post was then cut out of the bottom piece using my dremel tool.
 
renuzit 6.jpg
The centering ring was glued into the underside of the bottom piece with epoxy.
renuzit 13.jpg
The center post from the top piece pops out with a little pressure from below. The post is then cut off along the dotted line. The top ring that is left over is just a bit smaller than a CR5020.
renuzit 3.jpg
A few layers were peeled off of the CR5020 then it was epoxied into the top ring.
 
renuzit 4.jpg
The top ring assembly with CR5020 is then epoxied into the top piece.
renuzit 7.jpg
A piece of BT-20 was cut to 5 inches in length. This tube is to run through the assembled top and bottom pieces and is glued to the top and bottom centtering rings. A motor block is glued into the inside 2.5 inches from the bottom and a length of 100# kelvar is attatched to the motor block.
renuzit 8.jpg
An 1/8th inch basswood stand off was glued to the BT-20 and a 1/8 inch launch lug was glued to the stand off. If I were to do this over again I would have centered the lug on the BT-20 or even placed it on the lower half instead of placing it towards the top. This would make it easier to place on the launch rod
 
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renuzit 9.jpg
A 3/16 hole was drilled in the bottom 3/16 of an inch from the edge of the inside ring. This will line up with the launch lug when the top and bottom pieces and the BT-20 are all assembled.
renuzit 10.jpg
After twisting the top and bottom pieces together a spot was determined to drill a 3/16 hole in the top piece. The hole was drilled 3/16 of an inch from the inside of the CR5020 to line up with the launch lug.

At this point I quit taking pictures and the project sat on the shelf for a few weeks. When I came back to it I laid out the fins in GCADD and printed up patterns. I cut the fins from 1/8 inch balsa and shaped the root edges to fit the bottom contours of the renuzit.

The top and bottom pieces and the BT-20 assembly were all dry fitted to line up the launch lug with the holes in the top and bottom pieces. The BT-20 was then glued to the bottom centering ring and allowed to completely dry. The top piece was then separated from the bottom, epoxy was apllied to the top of the BT-20 and the snap ring on the bottom piece. The top piece was then re assembled with the bottom and the BT-20 paying attention to the position of the hole in the top piece so as to line up with the launch lug. The airframe is glued up at this point, the top to the bottom and the BT-20 to the top and bottom centering rings.
 
From here on it was just a matter of mounting the fins, making a nose cone and finishing the recovery system.

View attachment Renuzit temp.pdf

This is the fin template. The root edge needs to be shaped to fit the countours of the renuzit base. I did the shaping by eye with a piece of sandpaper affixed to 3/4 inch dowel. After the shaping I made a marking template in GCADD and printed it on 110# cardstock, the same template was used to align the fins once mounted. Five minute epoxy was used to attach the fins, I used 30 minute epoxy for the fin filets.

I had originally intended to use the blunt end of a small plastic easter egg for the nose cone. The egg half was a perfect fit for the top of the renuzit but I just didn't care for the look. Instead I decided to turn a nose cone on the lathe that was more inline with the vision in my head.

I had already attached a length of kevlar to the motor block but I wanted to add some round elastic shock cord. So Itied about an 18 inch length to the end of the kevlar.

I knew from the begining that there would be a very limited amount of space for the recovery system. After attaching the shock cord I became painfully aware of just how limited the space was. I had a 12 inch Estes chute that I had planned to use but it just wasn't going to fit. So I dug out a piece sheet of 1/2 mil mylar and cut a 9 inch parachute. Once the chute was assembled it could be folded into a one inch long package leaving barely enough room for two sheets of estes wadding, the shock cord, the chute and the nose cone shoulder. It was a VERY tight fit.
 
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