BARnone

[brianc]

Well I have some construction photos yet to scan in, but here's
sneak peek of my project for the last month or so. This pic is
from my $20 pencam, so the quality isn't the greatest...

I call it BARnone since it's my first scratch built since returning
to the hobby (computer folks like to start counting at zero )

The rocket is 51 inches, with a 24mm MMT. The BT is a
plastic drafting tube just a hair over 2" OD. Dry weight is
12-1/2 oz.

The fins are 1/8" balsa epoxied TTW. The leading, trailing and
tip edges are 5/8" caps for added strength.

The nosecone is 7 inches long and homemade on a drill.
It didn't turn out as good as I had hoped, but not bad for a
first attempt.

This uses a piston ejection of my own design (had to do
something to make this more than just 4FNC). The
BT & fin can separate 8" from the back. The piston
actually pushes the coupler out of the fin can.

I have a 24" Estes plastic chute inside now, but hope
to locate a suitable 30" nylon one soon.

I purposely designed it to be overstable (those fins
are 4" root x 3-1/2" span) so I can experiment with various
engines, chutes and even alternate bodies.

This might just get a flight on Saturday if the vendor
supporting the launch has any AT E15's or E30's.
Wish me luck!

 

[Elapid]

good luck on the flights!

 

[brianc]

And if you jump over here

https://rocketryforum.com/attachment.php?s=&postid=90664

You can find a screen shot of my Rocsim on Linux for BARnone.
This was an early design and not exactly as built, but the CG/CP
are pretty close.

Of course the CG is going to shift depending on the motor,
but as you can see, I have lots of wiggle room.

 

[brianc]

And of course, AFTER I finished major construction, I found
a similar design in a back issue of Extreme Rocketry.
(I swear I never saw this one before)...

https://www.extremerocketry.com/magazine/pdfs/issue13_nov2001.pdf

Caution - that's a ~6Mb PDF

See page 20 (magazine page 38).

Anyone know what that rocket is called?

 

[brianc]

Originally posted by brianc

This might just get a flight on Saturday if the vendor
supporting the launch has any AT E15's or E30's.

The two vendors attending had only E30's.

For some reason, I just didn't feel comfortable shootin'
this one off on that much impluse for a first flight... ;(

 

[brianc]

Originally posted by brianc
Anyone know what that rocket is called?

Well, surprise, surprise, surprise. I guess I inavertently
built a downsize RDS Quasar. See Jonnierkt's HPR pad
thread here.

https://rocketryforum.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=4195

 

[brianc]

Well, this bird finally got into the air at the SRA 6/19 launch.

The previous week (at NEFAR) I was reluctant to fly the E30
but after SIMing this motor at 1050 feet, I gained a bit of confidence...
Besides, all the vendors I've talked to say the word from AeroTech
is the E15 will not return to production.

So I picked up an E30-7 from <a href=https://www.rocketryzone.com/index.htm>RocketryZone</a>
onsite, prep'ed and walked to the LCO. Since this was a first flight, I
wanted to be sure he called a heads-up.

The rocket climbed straight on a rail almost to apogee, then laid
over and popped the ejection charge- and separated!

My hand-made braided kevlar was either not strong enough,
or too short (most likely). The 24" plastic Estes chute ripped
right off the shrouds and drifted away.

The fincan tumbled nicely and was recovered without damage.
The NC and body used the piston and elastic as a streamer
and also landed without a scratch!

In spite of the not-so-sucessful recovery, the proof of concept shows
the design works. I think the only changes I'll make will be some 3/8" flat
kevlar and (as I always planned), a nylon chute.

I think an F21 might also just be in order...

 

[brianc]

As promised, here's some construction photos. Wow! has it really been 3 weeks
since I started this thread? - Sorry for the delays.

Apologies in advance for the quality. These were taken with a disposable
and some were too close for the flash and things got washed out.


First up- it all starts with a tube.

My son's Scoutmaster showed up at the last Pinewood derby and had
the bracket charts rolled into some of these nice plastic drafting tubes.
DING! I gotta get some of those! (Does this qualify for the 'You know
you're a maniac' thread?) He gave me three.

The raw tubes are 36" long and have just over 2" OD.

 

[brianc]

Here's the Fin Can tube, MMT and piston.

The piston is a piece of cardboard tube coupler with a 3/16" plywood
bulkhead. Later I added a balsa spacer a t-nut and D-rings on each side.

The MMT is an Estes D/E kit (made with the E hook) and 3/16" plywood
centering rings.

 

[brianc]

Here's the Nose cone and fins.

On the fins, I added 5/8" model aircraft leading edge balsa on each
edge.

The NC started as a 2" square block and I had to add some 1/32"
balsa (after soaking in water to bend it) for the shoulder. You can see
the rubber bands holding that in place while the glue drys. After drying,
that was sanded to match the curve of the cone.

 

[brianc]

All the major parts.

The small coupler (with the black line in this pic) turned out to be much
too short. I ended up using a 4" piece instead. Once again I used
3/16" plywood on the coupler for a bulkhead.

 

[brianc]

Here's the fincan dry assembly.

 

[brianc]

Here's a dry fit of the whole rocket on a stand.

 

[brianc]

Another view of the dry fit.

 

[brianc]

And just for fun, here's BARnone alongside some of my son's fleet.

You can almost make out the Blue Ninja next to it.


Well, That's it! Hope you enjoyed this thread as much as I did
designing, building and flying the BARnone!