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cwbullet

Obsessed with Rocketry
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A thread yesterday got me started so let take a stroll down memory lane. What is your favorite rocketry website that not is no longer around? Post a description and link to it on the Wayback Engine Archive.

Example:
Vatsass Brothers - Rocket Team Vatsaas is or the Vatsaas brothers are three brothers - Brad, Rick and Mark. The site is a tribute to their favorite hobby and their outlandish builds.
https://web.archive.org/web/20150910054712/https://www.vatsaas.org/rtv/
 
I wrote many a build thread on RP, used to alternate between RP & here. Was REALLY disappointed when the site died...along with all my work!
Was it ever made public what the cause of Darrell M's death was?

I especially liked all the news articles on the front page & wondered how 1 person could keep up with that site.Yeah I know there were several others helping [Mark??] but didn't Darrell do the bulk of new stuff on site?
 
I wrote many a build thread on RP, used to alternate between RP & here. Was REALLY disappointed when the site died...along with all my work!
Was it ever made public what the cause of Darrell M's death was?

I especially liked all the news articles on the front page & wondered how 1 person could keep up with that site.Yeah I know there were several others helping [Mark??] but didn't Darrell do the bulk of new stuff on site?

Darrell did all of the composition and programming to make the Joomla content management system interface with the vBulletin forum software in a way that neither were designed to do.
Lucas Kalathas was Darrell’s intern for the software. He went on to develop the Archetype Cable Cutter.
Brad Shea, Mark Koelsch, Aaron Head, John Smolley and I were all moderators with me lasting the longest. I was also the one who shut the site down when the software combination started failing frequently after Darrell died.
Darrell’s heart stopped. I confess I was concerned at the time that it might have been drug related, but it wasn’t. I suspect it was very similar to the bullet we’re all very glad you dodged, Jim.
I’ve been paying to keep the software on the server, but when my teeter-totter tilts more towards honesty rather than optimism I realize I don’t have the time (or technical skills anymore) to migrate it all to a new platform and revive it. That’s why I was so interested in the migration from vBulletin to xenforo here.
 
Steve’s comments on RP are correct. Darrell did a lot of customization and programming to get RP’s Joomla to interface with the vbulletin. They did not play well together and it took a lot. Also, complicating things was the fact that even then Darrell’s server was running really old versions of the software. There was no way to simply upgrade- it is essentially a rebuild from scratch from all the research I did.

Then, truth be told, Darrell did not really document what he did/how he did it. It would make it very tough to figure out what was happening.

Then the hardware server was old and getting flakey. We converted to a virtual, but the software version issues etc remained.

I spent a bunch of time rescuing other peoples sites that he hosted on the same hardware. It was time to go...
 
Joomla-VB is one of the reasons many site owners convert sites to static and just dump what they can’t upgrade when them move to another software.

Anybody else have a website they used to use that is gone?
 
Rocketry-Online was by far the best all around rocketry site ever, before Darrell experienced his personal problems and sold it. Unfortunately the site went slowly down hill after it was sold...
 
Yup. Rocketry online was nice. I still have a copy of the site.
 
Eerily, I still get ghost emails from Rocketry Planet every once in a while. Here's one from a few weeks ago:

Code:
Rocketry Planet Auctions - Auction Setup Confirmation
 
The following auction has been posted on Rocketry Planet Auctions:

Auction Name: The Wedgie Model Rocket Kit
Auction Type: standard
Quantity Offered: 1

Category: Rockets > Model Rockets
Additional Category:

Starting Bid: 14.99 USD
Buy Now Option: Available
Reserve Price: Not Set

Closing Date: Jun. 19, 2018 15:40:01

Click to view the auction

Thank you for your submission.
The Rocketry Planet Auctions staff
 
Eerily, I still get ghost emails from Rocketry Planet every once in a while. Here's one from a few weeks ago:

Code:
Rocketry Planet Auctions - Auction Setup Confirmation
 
The following auction has been posted on Rocketry Planet Auctions:

Auction Name: The Wedgie Model Rocket Kit
Auction Type: standard
Quantity Offered: 1

Category: Rockets > Model Rockets
Additional Category:

Starting Bid: 14.99 USD
Buy Now Option: Available
Reserve Price: Not Set

Closing Date: Jun. 19, 2018 15:40:01

Click to view the auction

Thank you for your submission.
The Rocketry Planet Auctions staff

Hmmm, I stopped all of the Paypal billing and automatic payments and I thought I shut down all the Joomla and vBulletin processes long ago, but I must have missed something.
I’m sorry about that.
It must be Darrell’s ghost!
Does the email come from the uhostme domain?
 
ROL auction is where I bough my first fiberglass rocket...Competitor 4 from Curtiss...his first offering.
Batch of 15 rockets if memory serves. Got it for 140.00 ,still have that rascal, flew the crap out of it. Convolute wound tubes, molded cone...only weighed 13lbs ready to fly!. Of course it was missing Av-bay bulk plates.[which he never sent after months of reminding ]
Back in 2004...I think.
 
I keep looking for more sites to post. It is amazing what you can find on wayback.
 
Wedge Oldham's Nike projects: https://www.nikeproject.com/

I followed these projects religiously!

I asked him once if the large Nike Hercules was still around, and if it could be made flight worthy again, he said yes & no. It is still around in garage, but no, it would never fly again...
 
Wedge is great to follow. I have not seen a lot from him for a while.
 
I bought a lot of my first collectible rockets from Jim Struckman's auction site. Don't recall the url tho...
And read a lot of info on rmr.
 
O.K. which forum logo rocket was best? newest, middlest or oldest??
 
Last edited:
Not even close - the newest logo is better. Thanks for the trip down the memory lane.
 
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