Double Shuttle 2024

[aerostadt]

Previously, I made the wings and internal bulkheads of the Double Shuttle with balsa papered with 20 pound stationery glued on with white glue. The last Double Shuttle used heavy balsa that was papered, so the wings were very strong, but papering the balsa with white glue was very time consuming. So, this time I decided to use light 6 mm Depron covered with adhesive paper. Most of the previous work can be found here:

https://www.rocketryforum.com/threads/double-shuttle-has-double-cato.49927/

The 2 objectives for this project are as follows:

1) Making the wings and bulkheads with light 6 mm Depron and finding out if the model will be strong enough to fly.
2) Put an electronic ejection charge in one of the gliders to separate both twin gliders at apogee.

The electronic ejection was decided to be a precaution to separate the twin gliders early in case if only one of the 2 motors fired. In hind sight I now think this is a good strategy to use because the delay time of the motors may be too long for a successful flight.

 

[aerostadt]

I want to thank Boyce Aerospace for their custom work on the nose cone and the T-sections used in the Double Shuttle. Boyce has been able to reduce the weight of custom nose cones. I think the previous 2 nose cone halves together weighed about 2.56 oz. The latest nose cone halves together weigh about 1.6 oz. Using an angle iron and the nose cone halves I was able to draw lines to cut the 3" body tube in half.

 

[aerostadt]

I printed out the internal bulkhead patterns from RocSim. I then fed the adhesive paper into the printer to make xerox copies. The adhesive paper copies were places on the Depron and many bulkheads were cut out with an Xacto knife. I bought 8 1/2" x 11" white shipping labels (compatible with Avery 5165/8165) from Staples in a box of 100 (laser/inkjet) several years ago.

 

[aerostadt]

The T-sections that Alex at Boyce Aerospace made for fit great in the internal 24 mm body tube.

 

[aerostadt]

I then cut out the wings from the 6 mm Depron and papered one side with the white adhesive paper. I found a source for black adhesive paper. I thought this will be great, because I paper the under side of the wings with the black adhesive paper and I don't need to paint the surface black. Unfortunately, I am not showing the black underside here.

 

[aerostadt]

For one of the gliders I glued the nose cone into the glider. On the glider I extended the 24 mm tube so that I could put in a wooden plug with a small hole for an e-match to go to the ejection charge. Because the nose cone is very thin, I carefully drilled a hole for the 24 mm tube. I also drilled small vent holes into the aft nose cone so the altimeter would work. The holes shattered the plastic a little bit, but I found that applying gap-filling CA glue to the damaged area restored the nose cone plastic to its original strength. I used a small Uno ver 2.2 altimeter from Boris du Reau at Bear River Altimeters. I used the larger 1S Lipo 3.7V 500 mAh battery to fire the e-match because in bench testing this combination always worked for me. Boris says the smaller 150 mAh battery will work if fully charged to 4.2V . Also, always bench test because the quality of batteries varies.

 

[aerostadt]

As hoped the Double Shuttle gliders had a weight less than the previous papered heavy balsa gliders. Using my food scale, which gives a rough weight, the adhesive papered Depron gliders had a weight of about 9 1/2 oz each. Each glider weighs about 2 oz less than the previous Double Shuttle. With this lower weight I decided to use a cluster of two black powder D12-4's. The advantage of the D12's is that I can get reliable cluster ignition using simple e-matches. The disadvantage is that the two D12's may be under-powered. The weight of a D12 is about 2 1/2 oz. I noticed that when I inserted the D12's into the gliders, the engine clip seemed loose, so I used plastic ties to help hold the motors in place. (The attached photo shows post-flight condition with plastic tie.)

 

[aerostadt]

The new Double Shuttle was launched successfully last Saturday at the local UROC launch. I was actually lucky that the DS did not launch the first try. When I went out to the pad, I saw that both e-matches looked fine. However, on one glider the poster putty used to hold the e-match in place had pulled away. Why the matches failed to fire, I don't know, but I was glad. I re-inserted the e-match and pressed the putty in hard using my finger nail and returned to the flight-line.

 

[aerostadt]

I made a sun shade hood for my camera, so that I could take movies. Otherwise, I cannot see the LCD screen reliably. (I think I am going to post my sun shade hood on a different thread.) You can see from the movies that I am still having trouble capturing the DS, especially after the twin glider separation. There is a few seconds after separation that I am completely lost as to where the glider went. A few seconds of the camera pointed at the ground have been edited out. In the last few frames you can see one glider flying over the flight-line. It ended up landing quite a distance behind the flight-line. So, altogether there were 3 ejection charges, one electronic charge and two ejection charges from the E12 motors. I am thinking the separation after apogee is coming from the electronic ejection. I can see a puff of smoke from one glider after the separation. I am thinking that is a motor ejection. After the gliders are out of sight I think I hear another motor ejection charge. I am thinking that the E12 motor ejections are coming way too late. If you figure that the E12 burns for 2 seconds and the delay is 4 seconds, then the total time from launch should be 6 seconds. If I look at the movie times, it seems like E12 motor ejection times are later than 6 seconds. If so, using the electronic igniton is a good idea.

 

[aerostadt]

I did a little bit of repair work and reinforcement after the Double Shuttle first flight. Since the wings are made of Depron, I painted the model lightly with Testor's spray paint. I got one new cockpit decal from Sticker Shock and had some Sticker Shock star-and-bars decal in my inventory, so I put those on. I applied some old Estes decals and some monokote trim that I had lying around.

 

[burkefj]

That looks really good, looks like he sent the cockpits from my orbital kit I had him upscsle for me..

 

[aerostadt]

That looks really good, looks like he sent the cockpits from my orbital kit I had him upscsle for me..

Probably, the same or similar. They are for the Orbiter glider of the 4X Estes Orbital Transport, which for my model corresponds to a 3 inch diameter. I've used the same ones on my 4x OT.

 

[aerostadt]

I flew the Double Shuttle on Saturday successfully. Unfortunately, I don't have many photos. I flew it on an Estes black powder E12-0 (Lot # J22-10-22) and an Estes black powder E12-4 (Lot #C21-03-21) with no problem. I put the E12-4 motor in the glider that had the electronic ejection charge. Both gliders flew well with no damage.

 

[messedupryan]

I flew the Double Shuttle on Saturday successfully. Unfortunately, I don't have many photos. I flew it on an Estes black powder E12-0 (Lot # J22-10-22) and an Estes black powder E12-4 (Lot #C21-03-21) with no problem. I put the E12-4 motor in the glider that had the electronic ejection charge. Both gliders flew well with no damage.

Bob????

 

[aerostadt]

Bob????

Yes, Hi, Ryan !