Dave Schaefer and I drove up to Windom, Texas Saturday for DARS' Shoot for the Stars launch. Wow, what an awesome, awesome day. Warm but not hot. Dry, Calm skies in the morning with a little breeze it the afternoon. It was a spectacular day for rocket flying!

My first flight of the day was my experienced Midget T40 , an upscale bashed using tube and nosecone from a Quest Big Betty, flying on a D12-0 booster to D12-7 sustainer and with a 2" streamer for recovery. Fantastic flight. I had been worried about staging, whether the sustainer would light. Even having painted some pyrogen in the sustainer nozzle, I was still worried. But she lit beautifilly and gave a spectactular flight straight up. Even though the rocket went out of sight, the smoke trail followed by the silver and red Squirrel Works streamer made for easy tracking and safe recovery with only some acceptable scratches on one fin.

Next up was my BettyGee getting max impulse from a D12-0 to E9-8 combo. Another great flight out of sight but tracked to safe recovery thanks to delay smoke and a brightly colored chute.

The venerable SuperGee put in a great flight on a B6-0 to B6-6 recovering nicely on a silver streamer. The shock cord was nearly burned through, but it was a polyester ribbon type which I'm no longer using. Kevlar cord is now the norm and will be installed in this bird before the next launch.

My Tuber put in a fantastic flight on a D12-0 to E9-6. Again that silver streamer made for easy tracking.

One non-flying highlight was James Gartrell's gift to me of an original Estes K-40 Midget complete with "Your Free Kit" sticker still affixed to the kit bag. It's been opened, and partially assembled, but it's a thing of beauty. I can't thank James enough for this kind gesture.

At NARAM 45, I flew my original Bidget (Big Midget, BT-60 based Midget upscale) on a D12-0 to D12-7 combo never to see the sustainer again After two years, its replacement finally made its maiden flight, again on a D12-0 to D12-7 combo with my favorite silver streamer for recovery.

Here the new Bidget is just coming up to pressure on its 1st flight:


After many, many Midget flights, I've concluded the Midget's CG can be a bit farther aft without adverse affect, but forgot to remove some of the noseweight already installed in the Bidget. Furthermore, this rocket had an elastic shock cord which is in disfavor here due to its tendency to pull the nose cone crashing back into the rocket. Anyway, while the rocket put in a great flight, it appeared to come to the ground rather quickly. Not sure if this was due to the added noseweight or if perhaps the streamer somehow was tangled thus failing to provide adequate drag. Anyway, the rocket was found with one broken fin lying on the ground.

Not sure if it broke due to the rapid descent and impact with the ground, or if it was somehow cracked by the recoiling nosecone and then knocked free when it hit the ground. Either way, it will need repairing, but it looks possible to glue it back on without major repair effort but it will definitely have a scar.

Dave got in several good flights, too. He flew his Estes AMRAAM in a Cochran event I think powering it on an F-something-or-other and recovering it safely. Here's a liftoff pic .

He also got in a nice G-powered flight in his LOC Legacy. The ejection charges were a little hot burning the chute's suspension lines but the rugged rocket was no worse for the wear. Here's a liftoff pic .

Dave's upscale Falcon got in a couple of great D-powered flights. Here's a pic of it just coming off the rod.


Last up for the day was the inaugural flight of my Midget 204, a 2x upscale of this classic missile.


It boosted on a D12-0 off a 6' rod, lumbering into the sky with great effort. All my flights that day had been 2-stagers with tape-together staging. 4 of those 5 used 24mm D12-0 boosters with pyrogen painted into the sustainer motors. The Midget 204 was designed for gap staging, but I glued an extension on the booster motor so it could be taped to the pyrogen-painted sustainer motor like the others.

The tape was the shiny cellophane tape, not the matte finish stuff. I recently learned the cellophane holds the motors together a hair longer than the matte polyester tape. The Midget 204 sustainer lit beautifully at staging for my 6th successful 2-stage flight of the day. Thanks to Fred Shecter for the tape tip.

Although the rocket had been crawling skyward, when the sustainer lit, it quickly accelerated and had a great flght, but at a non-vertical angle slanting to the south. The chute deployed fine and the rocket landed softly. Like the Supergee, it too used a polyester ribbon for shock cord. I had formed loops in the cord and applied many wraps of tape to be torn apart during a hard deployment as was the case here due to the non-vertical path. All the tape wraps had been torn through absorbing most of the shock, but alas, some more wraps were needed. A tiny zipper in the throat will have to be repaired before it will fly again To add insult to injury, the booster broke a fin on recovery, and will have at the very least an ugly repair scar or else require major repair. But hey, if you don't want damage, leave 'em on the mantel, right?

Nevertheless, I was tickled to fly it. With its weight, it's just marginal off the rod, but I now know for certain that it can be flown successfully. And it will do that again soon.

What an awesome day!

Doug

Midgets...

You know, one of these days I'm going to build a few myself...

Can't let you have all the fun...

Great flying report, Doug.

__________________
Craig McGraw

BARCLONE Rocketry -- http://barclone.rocketshoppe.com
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BARCLONE Forum -- BARCLONE Forum

BARs helping BARs

SAM 0044
AMA 352635

I agree. Sounds like your field is a lot more accomodating than B6-4 Field.
When did you change your website? I can't access the pics at work now.

__________________
Bill Eichelberger
NAR 79563

http://wallyum.blogspot.com/

I miss being SAM 0058

Build floor: Centuri Design Contest F-150 Hurricane Estes - Low Boom SST Semroc - Marauder, Shrike, SST Shuttle

In paint: Canaroc Starfighter Scorpion Estes F-22 Air Superiority Fighter, Multi-Roc, Solar Sailer II Semroc Cyber III

Ready to fly: Estes - Solar Sailer II Semroc - Earmark, Groonie Der V 1/2

Something like 3000 acres IIRC.

Sorry about that. It's a long story, but worth hitting a couple highlights. FTP access to flash.net went away around lunchtime. Then I couldn't browse my personal pages or even access the home pages for flash.net or prodigy.net. Went to mother site sbcyahoo, but it was little help. No status page to check. Duh!

I did find the 800-new-delhi number. DMF didn't know his backside from a hole in the ground. He wanted to change my browser settings. I don't think he even knew what FTP was. He was reading from a script and trying very hard to effect a non-Indian accent. Said his name was Mark. <wink, wink> Why they got to go all the way to India to find a moron to read from a script I'll never know. We've got plenty of morons here who can read a script.

Anyway, to get to your dilemma, I finally quit trying to ftp the pics to my flash.net pages and instead opened a yahoo/geocities free account and posted them there. I wanted to get the report posted before going out of town today. Looks like I have ftp access again, and could maybe copy the pics from geocities to flash.net, but alas, I can't get to geocities from my work computer either

But, you should be able to view most of the links including the three embedded pics. Only three of the links go to geocities.

Doug
One who appreciates it when tech support types know more than he does...