garydogwood
Well-Known Member
- Joined
- Sep 20, 2009
- Messages
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Hi all. glad i found this site. can spend all day reading here and never get bored.
I started rocketry in 2002 at the ripe age of 48 years old. built and launched quite a few of the Estes stuff on B and C motors. Also built and launched a couple Aerotech kits (Initiator and Cheetah). Didn't do much with it for the last 3 1/2 years until recently. My wife got me back into it.
Been doing the B and C engine launches but this morning i wanted to go further. We have a nice big field around here that is perfect for launching up to E size rockets (with land owner permission). Got to the site around 7:15am. nice and cool here with very little wind - in fact i could barely feel any breeze but apparantly there was a little wind at higher altitude.
First launch was my Big Bertha; i have always launched this on a C6-5 (C6 -3 is probably better). it did it usual spectacular launch. Rocksim show a little over 600 feet with this motor. I cannot really estimate very well but probably fairly close to that. i was actually thinking closer to 500 feet. landed about 75 feet from launch pad.
Next i brought out the Estes StormCaster. I flew this a couple times at a DARS launch event back in 2002 on D motors but never launched anything larger than a C motor at the site here in town. So, i pop in an Estes D12-3 and up it goes. Great straight up flight. good smoke. i could have probalby gone with a little longer delay (d12-5). even so, rocksim list close to 800 feet. seems about right. Beautiful coming down on the homemade yellow parachute. The rocket Gods were definitely smiling on me today. There is a row of trees about 500 - 600 feet from where i launched; the rocket literally landed UNDER the tree. i don't know how that happened but when i picked it up it was under the tree. Wheew!!
Next i wanted to try the Big Bertha again with an Aerotech reload. I recently bought the 18mm casing and loaded a D13-7 in there with a copperhead ignitor. I angled slightly into the slight breeze. pressed the button and heard a small pop and a puff of smoke. was thinking "Oh, Cra...." WOW!!! this thing took off with a roar. Those aerotech motors have a great sound. Well Big Bertha has never been so high (estimate 1200 feet per rocksim). it was a beautiful launch. angled slightly into the wind then parachute deployment at apogee (rocksim show deployment at agpogee). Took a long time to drift back down and was a beautiful sight. (again the homemade yellow parachute). This time, it missed the trees by about 12 feet. Incredible.
I should have taken the slight breeze into account and moved my launch location to compensate. The launch location i chose was based on the usual south wind so it drifts down the long end of the field. This morning the (slight) breeze was from the north east. but is was so slight it didn't make much difference but it was a little tense as the rocket approached the trees. Guess the trees were not hungry this morning.
SO, overall perfect launch day. I'm hyped up and ready to start building some more. looking forward to reading the hundreds or archive posts and hopefully contributing someing useful here.
By the way, I live a little north of dallas texas (Plano). Go Cowboys.
gw.
I started rocketry in 2002 at the ripe age of 48 years old. built and launched quite a few of the Estes stuff on B and C motors. Also built and launched a couple Aerotech kits (Initiator and Cheetah). Didn't do much with it for the last 3 1/2 years until recently. My wife got me back into it.
Been doing the B and C engine launches but this morning i wanted to go further. We have a nice big field around here that is perfect for launching up to E size rockets (with land owner permission). Got to the site around 7:15am. nice and cool here with very little wind - in fact i could barely feel any breeze but apparantly there was a little wind at higher altitude.
First launch was my Big Bertha; i have always launched this on a C6-5 (C6 -3 is probably better). it did it usual spectacular launch. Rocksim show a little over 600 feet with this motor. I cannot really estimate very well but probably fairly close to that. i was actually thinking closer to 500 feet. landed about 75 feet from launch pad.
Next i brought out the Estes StormCaster. I flew this a couple times at a DARS launch event back in 2002 on D motors but never launched anything larger than a C motor at the site here in town. So, i pop in an Estes D12-3 and up it goes. Great straight up flight. good smoke. i could have probalby gone with a little longer delay (d12-5). even so, rocksim list close to 800 feet. seems about right. Beautiful coming down on the homemade yellow parachute. The rocket Gods were definitely smiling on me today. There is a row of trees about 500 - 600 feet from where i launched; the rocket literally landed UNDER the tree. i don't know how that happened but when i picked it up it was under the tree. Wheew!!
Next i wanted to try the Big Bertha again with an Aerotech reload. I recently bought the 18mm casing and loaded a D13-7 in there with a copperhead ignitor. I angled slightly into the slight breeze. pressed the button and heard a small pop and a puff of smoke. was thinking "Oh, Cra...." WOW!!! this thing took off with a roar. Those aerotech motors have a great sound. Well Big Bertha has never been so high (estimate 1200 feet per rocksim). it was a beautiful launch. angled slightly into the wind then parachute deployment at apogee (rocksim show deployment at agpogee). Took a long time to drift back down and was a beautiful sight. (again the homemade yellow parachute). This time, it missed the trees by about 12 feet. Incredible.
I should have taken the slight breeze into account and moved my launch location to compensate. The launch location i chose was based on the usual south wind so it drifts down the long end of the field. This morning the (slight) breeze was from the north east. but is was so slight it didn't make much difference but it was a little tense as the rocket approached the trees. Guess the trees were not hungry this morning.
SO, overall perfect launch day. I'm hyped up and ready to start building some more. looking forward to reading the hundreds or archive posts and hopefully contributing someing useful here.
By the way, I live a little north of dallas texas (Plano). Go Cowboys.
gw.
You're going to love both!
