A10-3T motor failures

[rcode]

Is anyone else having trouble with A10-3T motors exploding / CATO's? I have 5 out of 8 of these explode, all with a date code of B180619. I have 4 more packs (of 4) also with this same date code and not sure if I want to use them.

 

[cwbullet]

Not me. Nor have a I see a lot as prefect.

 

[fulldec]

I was doing some piston launcher testing a few years ago and had a run of bad A10-3Ts. They were blowing the nozzles out not "exploding" and all from the same date code. Like you, I had about four packs left. I think Estes replaced them,

Except for that batch, I never had any other trouble with them.

Don

 

[HHaase]

Late to the party on this one, but did you file MESS reports for those?

-Hans

 

[rcode]

I did not file a MESS reports and Estes stated they would do nothing about the 4 unopened packs since they have not failed yet nor have they replayed anymore after sending a link to the videos I took. These files are too large to upload but here are some snapshoots from both MIRVS

 

[rcode]

View attachment Sequence 1.mp4

 

[rcode]

i was able to edit the files down into one

 

[mikewrt]

Wow that is a CATO. RIP MIRVs. Were you flying just the sustainer or with the booster too? If in the 2 stage configuration did the failure happen at staging?

 

[HHaase]

Yikes! That's pretty energetic for a 13mm CATO. That first one looks like the propellant and delay burned ok but had too big of a deployment charge. The second one almost looked like it fired the deployment charge right at burnout.

-Hans

 

[HHaase]

A google search of the date code came up with more CATO of the same batch, with the same or similar failure modes.
I'd definitely NOT fly those motors.

https://www.rocketryforum.com/threads/estes-a10-3t-2-catos-batch-b180619.154548/https://www.motorcato.org/search?id=1130https://www.motorcato.org/search?id=1247