Chilly
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- Joined
- Feb 2, 2009
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Well, the stars finally aligned and I was able to make it to a Tripoli Mid-Ohio launch yesterday and had a great certification flight.
The weather started out cruddy but cleared out pretty nicely by early afternoon, with hardly any wind. A friend from NAR, Bill Huber, gave me an H165 Redline and looked over my shoulder while I assembled the motor. First, he had to take his L2 test so while he was doing that I flew my new Weasel-29 on an F50-9T. It was a nice shakedown flight and the rocket landed about 100 yds from the pad. Even K-motor monstrosities were coming down close without electronics, the wind was that calm.
So anyway, Bill finished his test, I built the motor (only my second RMS, it's really not as hard as I thought it'd be), and I loaded it into my LOC Stovi, the "Russian Menace". I modified it for positive retention by epoxying wood plugs into two of the outboard tubes, with good ol' t-nuts and screen clips. Our prefect, Gary Dickinson, gave it a thumbs-up and I loaded 'er up.
The Stovi so far has flown on an F50, G40, and G80. The H165 was quite a kick as you could imagine! Big bright red flame and BOOM! It took off like a bomb had been lit under it, just booted the thing to about 1800'. It just seemed to coast and coast, then got a good chute. The delay looked a little short to my eyes but it all came down in once piece and landed even closer than the Weasel had. There was a small dent, not enough to call a zipper, in the airframe lip so the delay probably was a little short. But it was flyable again and Gary pronounced me an official Level-1 rocket jock...finally! It's been a long wait.
I'll have pics added soon as the film's developed.
The weather started out cruddy but cleared out pretty nicely by early afternoon, with hardly any wind. A friend from NAR, Bill Huber, gave me an H165 Redline and looked over my shoulder while I assembled the motor. First, he had to take his L2 test so while he was doing that I flew my new Weasel-29 on an F50-9T. It was a nice shakedown flight and the rocket landed about 100 yds from the pad. Even K-motor monstrosities were coming down close without electronics, the wind was that calm.
So anyway, Bill finished his test, I built the motor (only my second RMS, it's really not as hard as I thought it'd be), and I loaded it into my LOC Stovi, the "Russian Menace". I modified it for positive retention by epoxying wood plugs into two of the outboard tubes, with good ol' t-nuts and screen clips. Our prefect, Gary Dickinson, gave it a thumbs-up and I loaded 'er up.
The Stovi so far has flown on an F50, G40, and G80. The H165 was quite a kick as you could imagine! Big bright red flame and BOOM! It took off like a bomb had been lit under it, just booted the thing to about 1800'. It just seemed to coast and coast, then got a good chute. The delay looked a little short to my eyes but it all came down in once piece and landed even closer than the Weasel had. There was a small dent, not enough to call a zipper, in the airframe lip so the delay probably was a little short. But it was flyable again and Gary pronounced me an official Level-1 rocket jock...finally! It's been a long wait.
I'll have pics added soon as the film's developed.