Rocket Glider

[barone]

Well, yesterday my wife decided I needed to entertain my niece and her friend by launching a few rockets :) . I never turn down an invitation to launch so I gathered up a few rockets, prepped them and headed to the launch site.

One of the rockets I put up was a rocket glider on a C6-3. Nice straight boost with an exceptional transition to glide. It was doing really well when it banked and came down in a little steeper glide angle :confused: . All in all, a pretty nice flight but I was wondering why it suddenly just glided in instead of hangin in the thermals.

Well, the picture below kinda explains it. Looks like the wing caught fire from the engine exhaust and continued to burn in the glide phase until the wing lost some of it's lift. :o Now it's off to get some more balsa and build another wing. Of course, this time, I think I'll apply a coating of CA. And here I thought I had my rockets ready for the regional next month :(

[CPMcGraw]

...the picture below kinda explains it. Looks like the wing caught fire from the engine exhaust and continued to burn in the glide phase until the wing lost some of it's lift. :o Now it's off to get some more balsa and build another wing. Of course, this time, I think I'll apply a coating of CA...

Looks like the thrust also caught some of the fuselage a couple of inches back, too. Have you flown this with a "C" before, and not had the thrust scortch the wing?

I'm also wondering if some of the deployment charge might have blown out and back, sticking to the wing and starting ignition that way...

[barone]

Looks like the thrust also caught some of the fuselage a couple of inches back, too. Have you flown this with a "C" before, and not had the thrust scortch the wing?

I'm also wondering if some of the deployment charge might have blown out and back, sticking to the wing and starting ignition that way...Best I can tell, the wing was still in the boost position when it caught fire and was still burning when it transitioned forward. The burns on the forward portion of the boom match the outline on the wing. I thought about the ejection charge also but concluded that it must have been the exhaust since the wing was in the boost position when it caught fire (as evidenced by a bit of a scorch mark on the boom towards where the leading edge of the wing was in boost).

[CPMcGraw]

Best I can tell, the wing was still in the boost position when it caught fire and was still burning when it transitioned forward. The burns on the forward portion of the boom match the outline on the wing. I thought about the ejection charge also but concluded that it must have been the exhaust since the wing was in the boost position when it caught fire (as evidenced by a bit of a scorch mark on the boom towards where the leading edge of the wing was in boost).

I follow now: The wing was behind that fuselage scortch mark for the launch position, and slid forward at burnout. (DUH! Shows you I'm not a BG flyer yet...) Perhaps the motor pod could be raised above its present position by as little as an eighth of an inch, and no more than a quarter inch, while maintaining the same downthrust angle. This might be enough for the thrust to clear the model without increasing the overall weight excessively...

[dwmzmm]

Nice looking R/G, though. Looks almost like my upscale CMR Buzzard! The main difference
with my model is the pod "hangs" on the opposite side, so there's no chance the wing area
will get scortched.

[barone]

I follow now: The wing was behind that fuselage scortch mark for the launch position, and slid forward at burnout. (DUH! Shows you I'm not a BG flyer yet...) Perhaps the motor pod could be raised above its present position by as little as an eighth of an inch, and no more than a quarter inch, while maintaining the same downthrust angle. This might be enough for the thrust to clear the model without increasing the overall weight excessively...The plans called for the pylon to be 1/2" high but I've got another design that is set at 3/4" so I think I'm going to try again at the 3/4" height. This was the first rocket glider I've flown....done a lot of boost gliders with no problem like this.... :rolleyes:
Nice looking R/G, though. Looks almost like my upscale CMR Buzzard! The main difference
with my model is the pod "hangs" on the opposite side, so there's no chance the wing area
will get scortched.I think this is a George Gassaway design called the Stiletto-C.