Report a Malfunctioning Engine

[flyingeagle]

I have done that and the other question I asked yesterday was about the E9 motors. I have several of them I bought just before the E12s came out. I hear good things about the E9 but also bad. I’m a little afraid of them in my rockets because of a high CATO percentage.

 

[flyingeagle]

All I was asking if anyone ever ordered from Hobby Link and are they any good? I was just wondering if their motors are old stock that would have a higher percentage of CATO! I looked at some research of the F motors especially the F15-0 that has a bad rating on CATO. Why can’t these manufacturers make a motor that won’t CATO? The manufacturers of shot gun shells it’s very rear you ever hear of a shell miss firing. Oops that another subject right? Do I have to start a new thread about that?

 

[Banzai88]

All I was asking if anyone ever ordered from Hobby Link and are they any good? I was just wondering if their motors are old stock that would have a higher percentage of CATO! I looked at some research of the F motors especially the F15-0 that has a bad rating on CATO. Why can’t these manufacturers make a motor that won’t CATO? The manufacturers of shot gun shells it’s very rear you ever hear of a shell miss firing. Oops that another subject right? Do I have to start a new thread about that?

ETA: Apologies to everyone for further derailment of the main topic of the thread.

Since you've decided to make a spectacle of yourself, I'll go ahead and volunteer to answer your questions since they seem non-rhetorical: Yes, you should have started a new thread from the start, as was casually mentioned to you before you went on your rant. It's simple public forum etiquette and protocol.

The constraints of and circumstances of BP motor construction and the correlation between size- and handling-to-CATO events are well understood. Information easily found with the SEARCH function as it's been discussed and explained ad nauseum (and probably reviews of Hobby Link as well). TLDR, it's endemic to the design of BP motors and increases as a hazard exponentially the larger you scale up a BP propellent grain.

As to your straw man questions, shotgun shells, and many metallic cartridges, 'miss fire' and have lot recalls ALL THE TIME. Every manufacturer, even the IMI stuff! They're posted on the manufacturers web sites and widely distributed in the firearms press. Just because YOU don't hear about them doesn't mean that it isn't happening. And when it does happen, it's usually to the tune of several MILLION rounds of ammunition (that are then recovered as much as possible and destroyed)....as opposed to MAYBE happening to several hundred rocket motors.

And YES, that would ALSO be a separate thread for The Watering Hole, or a simple question in the Guns & Rockets thread already established.

 

[Gastrok]

A couple of our members had a couple of Big Daddy drag races at the recent CMASS launch. The first one was on D12's and the flights looked like they were synchronized. The next race was on a pair of E12's from 2011 and, unfortunately, they synchronized again. MESS reports were filed and the third motor in the same pack will be a ground test or soaked in a bucket of water.
Credit Jeremy H. for the photo
View attachment 576907

Just realized I'm in this photo from last Saturday. The blue rocket in the middle of the picture is mine and it CATO'd shortly after this on an Estes E16-6. I won't be trying to fly the other motor in that package. Don't trust it.

 

[flyingeagle]

WOW! That sucks! I have a couple of these motors and just ordered a pack of E16-4

 

[smstachwick]

WOW! That sucks! I have a couple of these motors and just ordered a pack of E16-4

The thing to look for is the date code. It’s a sequence of letters and numbers printed on the motor that indicates in some obscure code its date of manufacture and possibly some other details. Estes knows how to decipher them.

If you have a CATO, use motors of the same type designator and date code with extreme caution, or dispose of them by soaking them in water overnight until the casing unravels. The remains can be thrown away in regular trash safely.

Oh, and of course, file a MESS report!