Set up and shut down

I am looking for ideas on how to encourage participation in the set up and the teardown of a rocket launch. Our local club has a lack of participation and a mass exodus at shut down time. How does your club encourage participation?

Tony

Fortunately, MDRA is filled with people who like to help. We are very blessed in that regard.

However, having dealt with similar situations in other types or organizations, you might try this. At least it will help with set-up.

Announce in an e-mail and on the web site that set-up will not begin until there are X number of people present to help. If launch is supposed to be from 9 - 5, don't start launching until set-up is complete, and don't start setting up until the required number of helpers are present. So maybe it doesn't start until noon!

No ideas for break down.

I thought you were going to offer “no flight fees”? No takers?
We advertise on our launch status email “seeking help” and there’s usually 1 or 2 who stick around.

I have thought about having an invitational only launch for those that help with setup and / or tear down.

How busy is your launch schedule?
Maybe people that help set up and break down get first priority in getting their Rockets to the pads?

BABAR said:

How busy is your launch schedule?
Maybe people that help set up and break down get first priority in getting their Rockets to the pads?

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Interesting idea - kind of like a front of the line pass from Disney.

I also thought about tickets and if you collect 5, you get a free T-shirt. Something on the back like: “I did a lot of work for this lousy t-shirt”

I am part of a club that took a deposit for events. The monies were then split among the cleanup crew who stuck around.

At our bigger launches those who stay to help with tear-down get a ticket in a special drawing.

Not really sure how to crack that nut. I think that it comes down to personal responsibility, and how people deal with people. I think that a lot of folks see their launch fees/club dues as transactional...purchasing the service of being allowed to use the equipment and land as a whole package, seeing the set up/tear down as separate events from the launch itself (which many take for granted). It can also be tied to travel time, too. No way logistically that I can travel 3 hours to one club, and 4 to another 1 way and safely be up in time to be there for set up. If the family goes, well, kids gotta be fed in the evening, too. Fear of the unknown is part of it, too. Folks don't really know what to do and won't admit it, so they resort the the comfort of doing nothing.

I'll admit to being not so good either with my home club, but recently I've been trying to make at least 1 of the two...set up or tear down a part of my day at the field. I try to build it into MY personal schedule for the day, but sometime life arranges things due to its own priorities.

A club is about cooperation. In any group, there's always an inner core, a group within a group, if you will. That core usually does most of the work. I'm not trying to break into that circle, just pay my social dues.

I can't do the scout days, though. I've tried. I'm OK with the person, it's people and crowds that I can't deal with (of about any nature). Theme parks, concerts, etc, it's all I can do to hold it together(and sometimes can't)......so I don't do scout days.

More baristas.

Raffle item, a special one, tickets only for those who help.

It is funny about travel time. My family and I have one of the longest drive, yet, we feel the biggest obligation to stay and clean up.

This launch was especially bad because we had a large number of expended igniters littering the ground. Is it really hard: If you place an igniter, take an igniter to the trash.

cwbullet said:

It is funny about travel time. My family and I have one of the longest drive, yet, we feel the biggest obligation to stay and clean up.

This launch was especially bad because we had a large number of expended igniters littering the ground. Is it really hard: If you place an igniter, take an igniter to the trash.

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I like Kloudbustes' idea. They keep a 5 gallon bucket at each pad bank. When you rack your rocket, you throw the previous flier's wires in the bucket. Next person to use the pad you just flew off of throws out your igniter wires.

We also keep a 5 gallon bucket at each launch pad location. If it's there, people feel an obligation to use it, and it makes clean up sooooo much faster.

Banzai88 said:

We also keep a 5 gallon bucket at each launch pad location. If it's there, people feel an obligation to use it, and it makes clean up sooooo much faster.

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Funny you bring up the bucket. There was a bucket at each pad bank. The igniters were littered all around it. I guess you can’t fix stupid or lazy.

cwbullet said:

Funny you bring up the bucket. There was a bucket at each pad bank. The igniters were littered all around it. I guess you can’t fix stupid or lazy.

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Stop the launch every hour or so and have someone pick up the igniters and plugs at each pad - SLOWLY. Make people wait while someone does housekeeping and they should learn to avoid the problem in the first place by cleaning up after themselves.

Raise your launch fees and give a discount to people who set up and tear down.

Good ideas - keep em coming.

Our club's LPR launches have posted launch schedules like "We'll start setting up at 10 and start flying as soon as we're all set up. Come help so we can fly sooner!" You'd need to adapt it for cleanup. Or maybe just park a big truck across the driveway 30 minutes before closing, and announce that it'll move when everything is cleaned up.

Our club has a core group of members that usually attends our launches. We all get involved with setup and pack up. More often than not, other members that turn up will usually help out. There are always the few that turn up late and leave early; or parents with children in tow that find it difficult to help out at every launch.

In general it’s not an issue at our low/mid power launches. However, at our high power launches it’s usually left to the core group.

In your case, and others, I think you just have to appeal to their consciences and have a roster of volunteers when each launch day is announced.

Voyager1 said:

There are always the few that turn up late and leave early; or parents with children in tow that find it difficult to help out at every launch.

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This is me. When I have all three boys I don't even bring the pop-up. It's all I can do to get them one flight each, then home again.

NateB said:

I am part of a club that took a deposit for events. The monies were then split among the cleanup crew who stuck around.

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The more I think about this, the More I like it. I might pitch this to the leadership of both clubs.

We have two all day volunteers only launches a year.

Do you use flight cards? Along the lines of above, cut out times (first couple hours when cooler or other times with optimal winds.) Helping Volunteer getting there 15 min early get three gold cards. 10 minutes 2. 5 minutes 1. Final clean up crew gets the same usable at next launch. Have 2 pad lines, golden card and standby.

cwbullet said:

The more I think about this, the More I like it. I might pitch this to the leadership of both clubs.

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It didn't solve the problem of the same group of people always cleaning up, but it does help a little to lessen the sting of always doing the grunt work. I think giving up a cleaning deposit also helps with the guilt when you can't stay for some reason.

I was thinking the same as some others.

CASH.

Everyone, at every launch, member or not, pays a two dollar "use fee" for the equipment and set-up. At the end of the day, after the clean-up, use-fees are refunded to everyone who helped. "extra" use fees can go to the volunteers after each launch, or save them up to buy the volunteers gifts at the end of year party, or to fund a discount for the volunteers at an annual club dinner. If set-up is a problem, those who volunteered for set-up are exempted from paying. In one club that I've attended, Columbus, OH, I think, many of the members went to lunch/dinner after the launch but after they all stayed to help clean up.

Banzai88 said:

A club is about cooperation. In any group, there's always an inner core, a group within a group, if you will. That core usually does most of the work. I'm not trying to break into that circle, just pay my social dues.

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I have found this entire conversation very interesting. I think the question is really how involved are the rank and file members? For setup, teardown, RSO, cleanup, whatever..... Your club either has or has not good involvement. Banzai88's entire post is spot on from my perspective - but specifically the quote above.

My first year in my local club was spent attending every meeting and looking for an opportunity to get involved. My dues are near nothing and I felt like I was getting a tremendous deal. I was eager to 'pay my social dues'. Finally - at the end of the season - an equipment cleanup party. This was something I could do. I felt good about the day, until the very end. One of the inner core pulled out the lost and found...

I remember it being kind of funny that I realized just then - somebody else could have tripped over one of the 2 or 3 rockets I had already sent to the gods by that point. Of course! There had to be a lost and found.

Then I watched the core group divy up some pretty neat stuff. I assume that I could have spent less than an hour of the day that I spent cleaning up their equipment, sifting through launch cards to match these goodies up their owners.

From that day on, I have called it even with a clear conscience. I get to use their site and equipment for a nominal fee, and they get to keep any of my stuff they find.

Good stuff. I personally don’t mind cleaning up, but as I age, I would like more help.

shonc182 said:

One of the inner core pulled out the lost and found...

I remember it being kind of funny that I realized just then - somebody else could have tripped over one of the 2 or 3 rockets I had already sent to the gods by that point. Of course! There had to be a lost and found.

Then I watched the core group divy up some pretty neat stuff. I assume that I could have spent less than an hour of the day that I spent cleaning up their equipment, sifting through launch cards to match these goodies up their owners.

From that day on, I have called it even with a clear conscience. I get to use their site and equipment for a nominal fee, and they get to keep any of my stuff they find.

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That behavior that you describe seeing, where instead of trying to get people their stuff back they divvied it up like the spoils of war, that's what I call 'stealing'. At that point, seeing something that you like and hide it would become the normal behavior. Disgusting. I would probably make the same decision that you did, purely transactional. And I'd make damn sure that everyone knew what was going on.

Every club that I've launched with has had a "Lost and Found" bucket at the RSO/LCO table, as well as made effort to publish descriptions and photos to everyone on the mailing list, which you had to sign in on for the day to launch. Unclaimed foundlings were reserved for KIDS and guests, so that they could launch that day and take home a memento....hopefully to fan the flames of desire in their hearts.