Micro help for C.J..... I've been bitten!

[Micromeister]

I haven't seen the little tubes before either Jim:
I'll bet they are new with the recent batch of Micro Q2's, Hope to see some when my order of MMX-II NE's come in shortly.

In the past i've alway crushed off the little glass bead to make it easier for use with my wadding ball method, haven't had any problem at all shorting after removing the bead.
the Q2's with or without pyrogen are Great for clustered micros.

Very Nifty adaptation of the Yellow tripod pad Backjack very inovative

 

[shreadvector]

Are you talking about the yellow pad in the pictures above? They've been around for a while. I got one from Bill about 2 or more years ago. We were thinking of carrying them at the time but decided not to...

The new yellow pads are different from the old yellow pads. The central hub is slightly different. Look at it REALLY closely. Hopefully someone will post side by side photos for comparison.

 

[Micromeister]

It was a bright, sunny, windless day sooooo......time to fly Micro's!!

First thing was bending over the tiny pad got old the first time out.

I found an old camera tripod in the shed and it screamed "use me for a pad".
It had a hole for 1/4 in threads, so a short section of allthread was inserted and my Flis launch rod special was taped to it. No more bending over for this old rocketeer.

These Quest igniters are the bomb, if you haven't used them yet. You are supposed to insert them in the cardboard tube, then place it over a plastic thingie on the Quest pad. A little thinking and I came up with this: Drill 1/8 hole in the side of the used estes motor and insert a stiff wire. One benefit is the wire will slide in and out horizontally, to allow for different diam. rockets.

Out to the yard and it worked great! No more stiff knees and very easy to prep the igniter and rocket, about a 30 sec turn around time. Love it.

A little more brainstorming and I'm sure I can come up with something a little more elegant, but this seems to work fine.

I do remember the 60's when flying, had to do to tissue and toothpick thing, with estes motors, it did work fine. But these new igniters are so easy to use with my set up it negates the tissue issue!

Micro and Jim , have you used them yet?

Oh yeah, my mini launch went great.

That's sort of what I've been doing with a coiled par of 18ga starnded copper wires on all my micro launchers. the coil allows support of just about any size micro and give me instand smooth jaw microclips ready for any micro igniter I happen to have.

 

[gpoehlein]

Where'd you get that idea?
it's a very tiny piece of wadding, Heres another pic that shows a piece large enough for two motors.

Uhm - your picture from an earlier post in this thread (04sm) that said "half, then fold into small quartered loose wad" I was trying to envision folding a full square of Estes wadding in half, then quarter and trying to cram that whole thing into the motor between igniter leads. You didn't actually have a picture of the wadding, so I couldn't tell how much you were using. 'Tis why I said I though a whole piece of Estes wadding was a bit large! Your new picture clears it up very nicely - thank you for that (Granted, I can be dim at times! )

 

[gpoehlein]

Woohoo! I just got my order in from Quest!

Ordered a couple packs of the new NE motors (along with a half dozen packs of Q2MMX igniters) to try them out. I was interested to note that, aside from the packaging, there is no way to tell them apart from regular mmx motors. I think I like John's idea of coloring them red to distiguish them from the others, so I'll be coloring motors tonight!

Now, I gotta get off my duff and try a 2 stage MMX rocket.

 

[Micromeister]

10-4 on that Greg!
I have two huge Red magic markers waiting for my order as well. Coloring them red has done a fine job over the last couple years while we were testing. Depending on the marker chosen they do sometimes bleed a little in hot weather. haven't had much of a problem with "Magic Marker" brand permanent Red, if that helps any.

Did the NE's come with micro Q2's as well? and do they have the little tubes Blackjack was referring to earlier?

If your flying a standard type micro 2-staged, be very sure to use some sort of highly visible streamer and maybe a tad of tracking powder in the sustaniers. They get up there very quickly and way high. Can't tell ya how many unpainted test models simply vanished of the pad never to be seen again LOL!!!! ya hear this far off faint pop.. then the booster flutters back into view... thats about it.

Best returnable flyer so far as been the a minimum dia. downscle Hercules 2-stage with a 1/2" x 9" red mylar streamer.

 

[Micromeister]

Uhm - your picture from an earlier post in this thread (04sm) that said "half, then fold into small quartered loose wad" I was trying to envision folding a full square of Estes wadding in half, then quarter and trying to cram that whole thing into the motor between igniter leads. You didn't actually have a picture of the wadding, so I couldn't tell how much you were using. 'Tis why I said I though a whole piece of Estes wadding was a bit large! Your new picture clears it up very nicely - thank you for that (Granted, I can be dim at times! )

Sorry bout that!
The complete 8 pic pictorial page posted earlier showed all the complete process. I was trying to help Mark-II better See the process by posting a couple of the individual photos a little larger showing how it was inserted. Sorry, I should have been clearer.

 

[gpoehlein]

Did the NE's come with micro Q2's as well? and do they have the little tubes Blackjack was referring to earlier?

Yup - each package has 6 NE motors, 6 Q2MMX igniters and 2 of the little 6mm tubes (maybe 1/2" to 3/4" long - don't have them in front of me to check).

As far as 2-stagers - I'm thinking of starting out a bit bigger with a BT-5 model - maybe a 2-stage Mosquito, Quark or 220-Swift!

 

[Boosterdude]

Woohoo! I just got my order in from Quest!

Ordered a couple packs of the new NE motors (along with a half dozen packs of Q2MMX igniters) to try them out. I was interested to note that, aside from the packaging, there is no way to tell them apart from regular mmx motors. I think I like John's idea of coloring them red to distiguish them from the others, so I'll be coloring motors tonight!

Now, I gotta get off my duff and try a 2 stage MMX rocket.

I received my order yesterday, and the first thing I did was to put a black line on all of the NE's.

 

[gpoehlein]

A question for John (or anyone else who's tried staging these things):

What methods are you using to stage the micromaxx motors? Are you taping them together in the Estes fashion? Or are you gap/vent staging them in the Centuri fashion? What works the best?

 

[Micromeister]

Greg:
The answer to your question is YES! (Slapping forehead with palm..DOH!) LOL!!!

Seriously; Both methods have been used more or less successfully. Less when taped! In our studies gap and/or vented staging has been considerably more successful from the start. Personally I prefer a least a little bit of gap staging with vent holes werever possible.
I've even started omitting the tape on some minimium diameter models where the motors touch and the sustainer sits directly atop the booster using the motor as the coupling. Seems to work as well as magic taping them together. If there is a way to include a vent hole or two, I'd do it.

If your using larger body models T4 or BT-5, that should make gap staging a lot easier.

 

[gpoehlein]

Greg:
The answer to your question is YES! (Slapping forehead with palm..DOH!) LOL!!!

Seriously; Both methods have been used more or less successfully. Less when taped! In our studies gap and/or vented staging has been considerably more successful from the start. Personally I prefer a least a little bit of gap staging with vent holes werever possible.
I've even started omitting the tape on some minimium diameter models where the motors touch and the sustainer sits directly atop the booster using the motor as the coupling. Seems to work as well as magic taping them together. If there is a way to include a vent hole or two, I'd do it.

If your using larger body models T4 or BT-5, that should make gap staging a lot easier.

Thanks for the info - you have been breaking new ground here and it's silly for me (or anyone else for that matter) to have to re-invent the wheel, so to speak.

 

[graylensman]

Micromeister - looking forward to seeing some of your staged mmx birds go!

(I finally got approved to post again!)

 

[Viperfixr]

At the last ICBM launch he showed me the cool Quest micro kit he bought--looked like something fun to do in the backyard! Then Quest had their 40% off sale, and now I've got the big kit too. I am sure I'll be buying some Flis micros as well...just got my L2, and I celebrated with buying the smallest rockets out there!

Damn, this rocketry bug just keep spreading to new areas, and shows no sign of going away!

 

[graylensman]

Viperfixr- watch out when micros leave the pad. HPR are impressive with all the sound and fury, but micros head skyward in a hurry - you'll be surprised!

 

[BobH48]

In our studies gap and/or vented staging has been considerably more successful from the start. Personally I prefer a least a little bit of gap staging with vent holes werever possible.
If your using larger body models T4 or BT-5, that should make gap staging a lot easier.

How large a gap have you been successful with?

I'm wondering if I could just put some MMX motor tubes in this Omega downscale. It's BT-5 size and I have been flying it on 13 mm 1/2A3-0T to 1/2A3-4T. I think it would be a hoot on MMX,

 

[Micromeister]

Bob:
How much does it weigh?
To more directly answer your question, in one of the T4 experimental models I recall we got the seperation out to 1.5". I'd have to go back and find the sketch I seem to recall the booster stage was 2-5/8" overall with the booster motor extending 1/8" from the back of the booster stage and the sustainer motor inserted 1/4". I almost alway use two vent holes 180° apart but don't for the life of me remember if this model had one or two

It's been almost two years since i've done any real extensive staging experiments but seem to recall we found inserting motors less then 1/4" required additional external support for the sustainer. 1/4" and longer insertions were pretty much self supporting.
Dang looks like I'm gonna have to dig all these staging designs and test stuff out of mothballs...Oh Yeah!!!

Hope this helps.