I was only able to attend for a short while; had a Niece's B-day party in the afternoon. Nevertheless, was great to see everybody! Thanks Frank, Bob, Peggy, Carol, Dan, and Randy for being out there in those conditions...brrr! Thanks to Tim and Jackie for all the goodies....going to take a few days to sort through all that goodness!
I was only at the range for one flight so only have photos of 1 flight...sorry 'bout that! The first flight of the day took two attempts, and even then didn't work out so well...oh well! I refurbished a Loc Bruiser EXP that Barry or Ron built...it needed a bit of TLC. After installing 1010 buttons onsite, the slightly short EXP was placed on the rail. Thank you to Mark K. and Kevin H for the harassment...errr help getting it ready/on the pad.
So far so good.
Ok, not so good.:shock:
Replaced shear pins, did a quick inspection, all appeared well, and back on the pad. Liftoff on a CTI K940 White Thunder.
The rocket drag separated at main motor burnout. I'm thinking that with the tip over, there may have been damage to the coupler; certainly there was more wiggle room with the shear pins. Plus it was COLD, so the nylon shear pins may have been brittle. Plus, when I repaired the rocket, the coupler got shorter and the recovery space for chute, cord, nomex, etc. got smaller. It all added up to a separation following main motor burnout, thankfully the Missileworks electronics understood the situation and didn't fire the twin I outboard motors.
I spent the remainder of my visit tracking down the few different pieces, then had to head out. Apologies for not taking more photos; just didn't spend enough time at the range head.
-Eric-
