| Rocket Camp July1-3 |
| July 1-3, I helped my friend (and sunday school teacher) Randy Ballard run a small rocket camp at Providence Baptist Church (my old chruch). There were about five kids that came. On day one we built and flew Estes Alpha 3's on the churches softball field. Exept for two lost in a tree, and one ejection problem, all of the flights were good. They were all on A8 and B6 motors. On day two, we built and painted a Fat Boy, two Gemini DC's, and two Storm Chasers. All of these are Estes kits. They went together well, and painting them was a real experience. I have never seen a glob of paint almost a centimeter high on a nose cone before, but one kid did it! We fixed it though. On the last day we went out to Sun Valley High School and flew the rockets built from the previous day, and I flew some. This was a launch I wished I brought a camera to! First, all the kids flew their rockets on B's, C's, a few D's, and a few of the new C11's. All flights were very good. Then I tried to light some Apogee Components B7 and C6 13mm composite motors in my HV Arcas and Mini Marz Lander. Both failed to Copperheads. When the Copperhead popped on the Arcas it pushed it up about 4 feet! It got a good laugh. Then I brought out "Poop 'Chute" on an F40, and it's Crapperhead failed as well. Now everyone was getting restles, so I put the Flying Lampshade of Death on the pad with a G40W in it. The G's Copperhead worked this time, and the rocket roared into the sky. It was awesome! It slanted a bit after it got off of the pad, but flew straight up. Near the end of the motor burn it got a little wobbly, but not too bad. There was no ejection charge in the motor (that was planned), and the "Shade" slowly fell from the sky. It ripped a bit on landing, but that's repairable. The spectators really enjoyed the smoke, sound and fire. Then we let the kids fly their rockets some more, I helped a kid do a 3 C motor cluster in his Gemini DC rocket. I got all the motors to fire but for some reason it went very unstable. No damage, though. The kids loved it. Then I prepped the Night Hawk to fly on a G64W and two quick fuse airstarted D12's. Putting this big 4-incher on an Estes "E" motor launch pad was a sight to see. After getting it stable and on the pad we launched it. It went up about 20ft.,and the G64 CATOed! The nose cone came off, and it fell in flames with the D12's lighting on the way down. When it landed huge, orange and hot flames continued to shoot out of the wrong end of the rocket. Finally, it stopped burning. The G64 had blown the end of its forward closure off! The whole inside of the rocket was torched. The shock cord was gone, the parachute semi-survived, and the Nomex 'chute protector survived with lots of charring. One fin root was cracked slightly, and there was a dent in the side of the rocket. It was so hot that some of the paint on the body tube bubbled up! I really regret not getting a picture of this! Despite the way it sounds, the rocket did not have as much damage as you would expect from this. If I got a new shock cord and some motors I could probably fly it again. Even though it CATOed, the kids really enoyed this launch! Next I flew the Naked Shadow IV on an E9-4, and three B6-4's. It flew fine, but two B's didn't light. This was not the luckiest of all my launch days! Last I tried the HV Arcas again on an Apogee C6-10 13mm motor. It finally lit, and went a little unstable and out of sight. It landed way across the parking lot, narrowly escaping hitting a van. It had a slightly crimped body tube, but that was it. All in all it was a good launch. Not the best for me, but it was one of the most spectacular, and the kids really liked it. Their rockets flew well, too. |