NewEntity1
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- Dec 4, 2003
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Today at R.O.C. in the Lucerne Dry Lake, I fly my Estes Big Daddy again one time, and the recently finished Big Bertha Mod twice.
The Big Daddy went up flawlessly, and the modded Big Bertha went up nearly flawlessly the first time except for a little more angle to its flight than I would have liked. One the second flight however...
The rocket separated on ejection, and the main portion of the rocket cored sampled into the ground
I found on inspecting the rocket that the shock cord had burned through right above where it attached to the steel leader. I had either pushed the elastic down into the tube too far, or else I did not push the wadding down far enough.
Even more alarming, I found that the motor had try to fly the motor mount through the center of the rocket!
The BT50 tube had broken loose of the epoxy and pushed up through the centering rings, and furthermore the centering rings had partially broken loose of the BT60 body tube and tried to surge forward as well!!
This second motor had had a VERY tight fit into the motor mount, and I shoved it in pretty hard. I'm wondering if I might have cracked the grain near the top of the motor, causing it to burn much more rapidly. The reason I wonder this is that the first motor, and identicle D12, caused *absolutely NO damage* to the motor mount or any other part of the rocket.
At this point, the only parts that are salvagable are the nose cone, the parachute, and I could maybe cut the fins loose (since they were surface mounted). The rest is a crushed and melted pile of glop...more melted than cruched, actually, despite the core sample.
The Big Daddy went up flawlessly, and the modded Big Bertha went up nearly flawlessly the first time except for a little more angle to its flight than I would have liked. One the second flight however...
The rocket separated on ejection, and the main portion of the rocket cored sampled into the ground
I found on inspecting the rocket that the shock cord had burned through right above where it attached to the steel leader. I had either pushed the elastic down into the tube too far, or else I did not push the wadding down far enough.
Even more alarming, I found that the motor had try to fly the motor mount through the center of the rocket!
The BT50 tube had broken loose of the epoxy and pushed up through the centering rings, and furthermore the centering rings had partially broken loose of the BT60 body tube and tried to surge forward as well!!
This second motor had had a VERY tight fit into the motor mount, and I shoved it in pretty hard. I'm wondering if I might have cracked the grain near the top of the motor, causing it to burn much more rapidly. The reason I wonder this is that the first motor, and identicle D12, caused *absolutely NO damage* to the motor mount or any other part of the rocket.
At this point, the only parts that are salvagable are the nose cone, the parachute, and I could maybe cut the fins loose (since they were surface mounted). The rest is a crushed and melted pile of glop...more melted than cruched, actually, despite the core sample.