balancing rockets with school/work

Hey everybody,
Well, the the school year will soon be barreling up my (fill in the blank with your choice of words) like a freight train, again :bang::kill:. Anyways, since I've never balanced a hobby with school, I was wondering how do you balance making rockets while going to work and/or school? I've really enjoyed making a few rockets this summer, and it's not something that I want to trade for math homework, reading a dull book, and/or wasting away the hours taking notes. Any tips?

Thanks for the info,

The nice thing about building rockets with respect to time management is that most of the steps involve a short work time followed by a long period of adhesive curing (attaching fins, doing fillets, etc.). Steps like those aren't too difficult to fit in during the week (I'm not sure what variety of rockets you're building, but everything usually takes longer with mid/high-power than with low-power). I usually save sanding, painting, and other time consuming steps for the weekend.

All the time that you would normally spend glued to the television and/or the computer you can now spend building rockets, or at least a portion of it.

Pulled from random internet site:

"The typical teenager spends 104 hours and 24 minutes per month watching television and 11 hours and 32 minutes online per month." - US teens spend more time watching TV than on computer, June 26, 2009
https://www.physorg.com/news165213203.html

skybuster said:

balancing rockets with school/work

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I dunno, how much homework do you have to stuff in the nose cone to get the CG and CP right?

This is actually great training for the future!

1. Get a complex rocket with alot of steps.
2. Review instructions and group steps together in managable bites.
3. Set time goals for each bite. (i.e. 1 week to sand and fill all balsa)
4. Actually allow the whole curing time to pass before you jump on to the next step. Document it for us!

Perhaps allow your self 1 rocket per quarter, take your time, hone your craft.

Of course, there is also the don't leave rocketry behind, but incorperate it into your classes.

Chemistry - think about motors and how the chemicals react to heat (don't make your own)
History - we are hitting some awesome 50yr marks right now in rocket history
Art - figure out how to do that special effect
Physics - no explanation needed
Math - you will need for the above portion
Foreign language - consider Russian or Mandarin...
Biology - well you got me there
English - read history and fiction find your rocket muse
Economics - figure out how much money you will spend over your lifetime on rocketry (no hints!)

Enjoy class - find the fun in each subject.

Work? School? :confused2:

Take it from someone who wasted a lot of time in school and is now paying the price. Focus on the schoolwork first. Rockets can wait until you have some free time.

I am about to start my junior year of college at the end of the month and will be living at school and will have no time to build rockets. Though when I have free time I do play around in rocksim for future projects. My primary build time has been the summer. But like Rocketman said focus on the school work first and as others have mentioned if you manage your time properly, you will be able to fit build time and school work in with each other.

Matt

Take the Shop or Industrial Arts (that's what they called it at my school) class. You're going to learn all kinds of awesome techniques that you can apply to rocketry. I didn't do this, and man I wish I would have.

That being said, studying/homework is best done in 45 minute spurts with 15 minutes of downtime. Have your time well planned, take the 15 and use it for 1 or 2 steps during a rocket build, and go back to the homework while you wait for the glue to set.

I work from home full time for a remote company.....ask me what I do for lunch breaks

Rocketman248 said:

Take it from someone who wasted a lot of time in school and is now paying the price. Focus on the schoolwork first. Rockets can wait until you have some free time.

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+1

College & univ at 40+ years old.. you want hard & no time to yourself?!

support yourself, don't expect it from others.

We always find time to do the things we love.. Even if it is only one fin glued on per week..

Being an engineering student and all the groups im involved in has sucked away all my time. So much so, that due to school and work I have not launched one of my own rockets since 2009. Now I am apart of the schools rocket team, and we launch about twice a year.

If you get bogged down in work, finish your work before going to rockets. The rockets will wait for you!