- Joined
- Sep 16, 2010
- Messages
- 77
- Reaction score
- 7
This past sunday (10/16) was a breezy day for launching rockets here in Northern Colorado. I was flying my RW Formula 38 on an AT E23. Wanting to keep it low because of the wind. I attached my Alt3 via the usual fishing swivel hook to the nose cone. I armed the Alt3 and launched the rocket. The launch was successful and the rocket landed about 75 yards down range due to the wind.
I went to recover my rocket and download the data to my Iphone. Upon recovery I discovered to my horror that the Alt3 was missing! CRAP! Another $100 gone! https://www.rocketryforum.com/images/smilies/yikes.gif
At first I went back to the launch pad and try to visualize where it might have landed. The wind direction and speed was fairly constant so I figured it HAD to be somewhere between the pad and where the rocket landed. But how am I going to find such a tiny device in a dried out, overgrown dry grass field?!?
Then it dawned on me that the Alt3 most likely survived the fall to earth and if it did it was trying to do a Bluetooth pairing with my Iphone and the battery charge was near 100%. A quick google search to determine the Bluetooth broadcast range led me to believe that the Alt3 most likely had a maximum broadcast radius of 10m. What I didn't know was for how long will it continue to broadcast.
So I opened up the Alt3 app on my Iphone, and immediately saw that the app was trying to connect. I started walking in a zigzag pattern towards the landing zone. At about 50 yards it connected! OMG! I marked the first point with a stick. I then kept walking until it lost the signal. Marked the 2nd point. I continued until I had made a search square about 50 feet long. The Alt3 had to be inside the square!
After a few minutes of searching for the little black Alt3 in the brown grass and I found it intact! Woohoo! https://www.rocketryforum.com/images/smilies/1.gif Upon examination of the swivel hook, I noticed that the hook apparently was torn open by the ejection forces. I downloaded the data and the Alt3 lived to fly another day. I have since upgraded to a more robust hook.
thanks for reading
Jim
I went to recover my rocket and download the data to my Iphone. Upon recovery I discovered to my horror that the Alt3 was missing! CRAP! Another $100 gone! https://www.rocketryforum.com/images/smilies/yikes.gif
At first I went back to the launch pad and try to visualize where it might have landed. The wind direction and speed was fairly constant so I figured it HAD to be somewhere between the pad and where the rocket landed. But how am I going to find such a tiny device in a dried out, overgrown dry grass field?!?
Then it dawned on me that the Alt3 most likely survived the fall to earth and if it did it was trying to do a Bluetooth pairing with my Iphone and the battery charge was near 100%. A quick google search to determine the Bluetooth broadcast range led me to believe that the Alt3 most likely had a maximum broadcast radius of 10m. What I didn't know was for how long will it continue to broadcast.
So I opened up the Alt3 app on my Iphone, and immediately saw that the app was trying to connect. I started walking in a zigzag pattern towards the landing zone. At about 50 yards it connected! OMG! I marked the first point with a stick. I then kept walking until it lost the signal. Marked the 2nd point. I continued until I had made a search square about 50 feet long. The Alt3 had to be inside the square!
After a few minutes of searching for the little black Alt3 in the brown grass and I found it intact! Woohoo! https://www.rocketryforum.com/images/smilies/1.gif Upon examination of the swivel hook, I noticed that the hook apparently was torn open by the ejection forces. I downloaded the data and the Alt3 lived to fly another day. I have since upgraded to a more robust hook.
thanks for reading
Jim