HERC Meet 5-15-04

[jetra2]

Hi all,

Who here is planning on coming to the HERC meet this Saturday? I know I am! As normal, we are meeting at the HWY 56 field at or around 10am to fly some rockets! It'll be good to see ya'll again!

Hope to see you all there!

Visit: https://www.hercrocketry.org for more info and directions to the launch site!

Jason

 

[lets fly high]

I'll be there just as an on looker this time.

 

[eugenefl]

Originally posted by lets fly high
I'll be there just as an on looker this time.

Really? So you're not bringing along any small rockets? Joe, you should bring something with you!

I can't make it on Saturday. I have a family commitment at noon. I *might* come out at 10am just to catch the early risers. Who knows - I may actually have time to fly a pre-prepped rocket or two.

Next month I will have a few fun flights. There's the 4" Der Red Max, 3" Bullpup, 2.6x 29mm upscale Gyroc, 29mm upscale Deuce, and the 4" Patriot on an H motor! Hopefully we'll have our new field by then. (Ok, so I really can't fly *all* of those rockets on the same day. That's too much AP!)

If I don't make it, have fun. Joe - if you're not flying rockets, hold someone's camera and take pictures!

 

[jetra2]

Originally posted by eugenefl
That's too much AP!

Yeah, and that's blasphemy in my book!



Jason

 

[pdooley]

Count me in.
I will bring some new stuff.
I need help figuring how to vent my upscale Vigilante, looks like it will have to be gap staged.
Also need to paint the upscale Blue Bird, probably another late Friday painting party

 

[jetra2]

How's the painting coming, Pat?

I'm getting excited! It's just going to be me and my dad this time, but I'll be bringing some nice flyers! I'll have these:

• Praetor, C6's
• Hank - 2x A8, 2x B6
• Falcon, C6
• Patriotic Executioner, E18-7W's w/ STL Rocketry chute!
• Deuce, C6-5's

That's all for sure. I might bring my Flea (nekkid) to fly on a A8-3.

What ya'll bringin'?



Jason

 

[pdooley]

Originally posted by jetra2
How's the painting coming, Pat?

What ya'll bringin'?

Jason

Heehee, I just don't have the energy to paint tonight.. the Vigilante and Blue Bird will have to wait.

I did manage to build a new launch pad from some scrap lumber, should be a lot more stable than the porta pad.

Got some CD spool rockets, the quick tube downscales, and alas the ellipictal fin Duece in 5 coats of grey primer.

Jason, are you bringing your SBB??

 

[jetra2]

No, unfortunately, I'm not bringing my SBB this month Pat. I have to repair the MMT after it was damaged..it's a bit complicated to explain here, but i'll explain tomorrow.

See ya'll there! Bright n' Early, 10am!

Jason

 

[Leo]

Have fun all!!

 

[Zippy]

Since the launch is now over and this thread is aproprietly titled I figured I'd just list my own flight's here instead of starting a new thread.

Estes Patriot, C6-5: Typical fine flight for this rocket.

Estes Black Brant II, D12-7: Way up as usuall and a long walk and a bit of searching the woods to find it again as usuall.

Scratch D-Region Tomahawk, E9-6: Spun on the way up but a good flight anyway.

PML AMRAAM 2, F40-7: No property damage, nobody got hit. Fairly short walk. A good flight.

PML Mini BBX, G75J-M: Nice smokey flight, relativly short walk.

Scratch 3" Jayhawk, 2 x F52-5's: Fantastic first flight. Straight up and ejection near apogee. A fairly short walk even though I used a 42" X-form chute. The 1/4" dowel pitot tube snapped off on landing but is easilly repaired. This was my first cluster flight and it went off very well. I may do a not quite Tulanko sized pictorial on this rocket since I took webcam pics of it while building it.

 

[pdooley]

Here's a pre-flight picture of Mike's Jayhawk with Russell posing.

I was really impressed with the quality work Mike did on this build.

 

[pdooley]

It was a good day of rocket flying, airplane flying, helocopter flying and golf ball driving. Good conversation, just enough shade to keep from roasting, and even Eugene made it out for a little while.

My flights were nothing special, the only one significant for me was a clustered 2xE9 launch, the highest impulse I have used since returning to rocketry.

Looking forward to next month when the boys bring out some big toys

 

[eugenefl]

Pat, nice pic of Russ w/ the Jayhawk. I REALLY wish I could have stuck around for that flight. Oh, the pains of missing a day of rocket launching! I CAN'T wait 'til next month. Hopefully we'll have our new field. It'll be nice to open it up with some H flights. Glad to hear everything went well.

I brought out my HobbyZone Firebird II electric R/C, but unfortunately the wind was just too much for it. I think I chased the Firebird much further than any rocket I've ever had to retrieve.

I also got to fly my mini-A powered Edmonds Ecee. Very sweet long glide. A few minutes before I had to leave a dad and son stopped by to see what we were up to. We introduced ourselves and got them involved right away. Prepped in my car was an Estes Ninja with an A10. I figured the little guy would value it more than I would so I donated it as a "momento" for their first day out at a rocket launch. So off to the pads went an eager soon-to-be rocketeer. I think he had the most fun of anyone out there today. Did anyone give them our info? HERC website or TRF?

Anymore pictures from today? Take care all. I'm looking forward to next month.

 

[jetra2]

Alright! Sheesh...I'm sure you're all drooling over my beautiful writing in my perfect launch report...oh...wait...

Read it and weep, ladies and gents!

It was a great day to fly! It was kinda interesting, though. My dad and I left the house about 9am Saturday morning, and arrived out at the field about 9:60 (that's 10am to all ya'll smart ones! LOL) It was wierd. We were the first ones out there! Cool - that was a treat! It's not often you're the first one out to *any* meet! Anyways, after unloading and starting to set up and put on Bug-n-Sun screen, cause the love-bugs were out in force, along with the gnats and mosquitos. It wasn't all bad...they seem to like Pringles and Italian sandwiches, though!

Probably 10 or 15 minutes after we got there, Pat (pdooley) showed up, and started setting up his camp. Then the rocketeers started pouring in. First it was Mike Hoy (Zippy), then Russell (russ2p), Chris (ChrisVG), Eugene (eugenefl), Eddie and Joe (lets fly high). We all set up our camps, and started flying.

First up was my Quest Falcon on a C6-5. A NICE high flight to about 800 feet, with a perfect recovery under a *eek* 12" plastic chute. Landed maybe 200 feet from the pads. It's gonna be a nice day!

Pat then set up his little BT-5 scratch build on a A10-3T. 3-2-1-POOF! CATO! It seems that the nozzle blew out! Even though that happened, the motor still produced enough thrust to take it up maybe 10 feet, with a little bitty lawn dart at the end.

Ok...I'm just realizing that I can't report on every flight...I'll list the note worthy ones, though.

• Patriotic Executioner, E18-7W. Great boost, then she started to tumble during the coast phase, after apogee. Ejection...and a separation! D'oh! Both parts were recoved intact though. Post-mortem: Shock-cord burn through.
• Fliskits Rhino - CHAD staged C6-0 to C6-5. Wow...that was COOOOL. Staging was perfect, and she got WAY the heck up there! Easily 1000 feet! Perfect recovery.
• "The Pod" on a D12-5. Great flight, ejection was great, and the 18" X-Form brough 'er down nice and slow.
• Rhino, C6-3. Great boost and recovery, except when she landed a fin broke clean off. No problem - easily fixed with CyA. Diagnosis: When I staged it, the booster's flames burned part of the fins, weakening them.
• Patriotic Executioner, E18-7W. I did a quickie repair by laying the free end of the shock cord in some epoxy. Worked great! Great, loud boost and perfect recovery under the STL rocketry chute!

Ok...that's all for tonight. Sorry...no pix...the camera was acting up a bit. I think it was the heat...

Didya like it?

Jason

 

[Donaldsrockets]

Hey jetra2

Sounds like you had a great time with some nice rockets. I'm in South Florida and our launch got rained out about 2:30 PM.

Did you guys end up getting any?