April
1st (no-fooling!) Launches: The Good, the Sad, and the UGLY!
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Saturday, April 1st, we launched four rockets.... It was the end of Spring Break, a nice sunny afternoon, and Larry, Sarah, & Kim were feeling adventuresome! Larry launched his two newest rockets, the Flying Jenny and the Sam-X. Kim launched her Maniac, and Sarah launched her repaired Fat Boy. The Jenny is a rocket boosted glider, based upon
Estes' free plans in 1964 to a "Flying
Jenny".  
Jenny's maiden flight wasn't pretty! She flew about 50
feet up (A6-3 engine), then looped over toward the ground. She hit the
ground under power, ejecting the engine after landing.
All of her wings came off from the impact. Back to the drawing board.... 
This was the "UGLY" flight! The Sam-X is a two-stage rocket which can fly
to 2000 feet. It's the brown one on the left in this
picture. I launched it with a C6-0/C6-7 combination. It took off
at an angle and flew to at least a 1000 feet. We saw the tracking
dye when the nose cone ejected, but never saw the parachute. We recovered
the booster, but not the main stage. I'm hoping some young child finds
it and gets excited about rockets...! Kim's Maniac is a D-powered rocket. In
fact, that's why she got it! She liked the idea of a rocket which
requires the biggest Estes engine, and liked the name! This was it's
maiden flight...... 
She launched it using a D12-7, and it flew straight and HIGH! wRASP
software predicted a maximum altitude of 812 feet, but it looked higher!
We had a successful landing within 20 feet of the launch pad. 
This was one of the "Good" flights.  We've
recognized that the Maniac (the rocket, not Kim!!) has the same body
tube size as my Astrocam. Our next
flight may have the Astrocam nosecone with film instead of the Maniac's
nosecone.... Please check back soon.Back to top Sarah's rebuilt Fat Boy, the one with
the "Crashing Sucks!"
logo, was the last rocket we launched. By then, we had a crowd, and
we put a little boy named Sam to work launching the Fat Boy. 
Sarah had chosen to launch with a C6-3 (previous flights went about 330 feet). The nose cone ejected fine, but the chute was tangled and finally opened about 50 feet above ground, causing us quite a scare, but a perfect landing! 
Another "Good" flight... Back to top |
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