July 4th Launch/Flight report

[bikegod]

What better way to celebrate our country's birthday than blow something up.

I like fireworks as much as the next guy, but this year I got to add my newfound love of model rocketry, and the educational aspect with spending time with someone special.

We flew a schoolyard sounder (my design was way unstable but no one got hurt), a Code Red, my Chrome Gemini DC, Guardian, Nu-B1st, AstroSat LSX, Skywriter, and Semroc Javelin.

Winds were up, parks were closed and we were left with a small school yard in a neighborhood just off of the highway. We launched all about 20 off of perpendicular into the wind and had to trek just a bit downrange for recovery. Everything landed well with the exception of the Guardian (one fin broke on landing) and the schoolyard sounder.

The School yard sounder was a design I was playing with for some spare parts using a space plane type of configuration. The engine even ejected properly as expected though the plane hit the ground after clearing the launch guide. I noticed that the nose cone had set slightly off kilter, and possibly the body is too short. No Sim file on this one. I eyeballed it.

Here are two pics that I think sum up what I like most about this hobby.

Happy 4th (a few days late)

[tbzep]

Nice! I think you have cool little rocket buddy. :p

[bikegod]

She asked me tonite if I could take her to space camp.

My answer will be yes (eventually) but I think the National Air and Space Museum in DC (since we live so near to it) will be the first stop. Then we will keep flying rockets. So far she has built two E2X kits from Estes (that skinny silver and blue one and and Xray) but both got lost on first flights (my fault for using too big of an engine, but I got a good deal on a bunch of A10s).

Being a Dad is scary enough, but being a dad of a little girl keeps me awake at night. I try to get her involved in sports and stuff but...

At least she is interested in this. Despite the high heat and humidity out here we launched for about two hours. She was raring to go from that morning. We sat up the night before deciding which engines to use based on how big the rockets seemed to her and how far up she thought they would fly.

Oh, she also built (though I painted with her guidance) a Sizzler. I had it in the box but we had failed to install the chute and used a homemade nylon chute that I made for launching one of her toys into orbit. A little carpenter's glue from my kit and a piece of paper from some instructions and we were mounted and ready to go. We flew it on one of the large A engines (A8?) that are recommended for first flight and got a lot of altitude out of it. Nice kit for 5 bucks. I have to find a pic of it. Painted the thing yellow and she put this prism tape around the base of the nosecone and covered one fin. Looks pretty cool to me even by my Captain Anal standards.

[PaulK]

Cool. Sure is great fun to do with your child. I wish I had gotten my daughter involved at an early age. Well, my 8yr old son sure enjoys it!

-paul

[A Fish Named Wallyum]

What better way to celebrate our country's birthday than blow something up.

I like fireworks as much as the next guy, but this year I got to add my newfound love of model rocketry, and the educational aspect with spending time with someone special.

We flew a schoolyard sounder (my design was way unstable but no one got hurt), a Code Red, my Chrome Gemini DC, Guardian, Nu-B1st, AstroSat LSX, Skywriter, and Semroc Javelin.

Winds were up, parks were closed and we were left with a small school yard in a neighborhood just off of the highway. We launched all about 20 off of perpendicular into the wind and had to trek just a bit downrange for recovery. Everything landed well with the exception of the Guardian (one fin broke on landing) and the schoolyard sounder.

The School yard sounder was a design I was playing with for some spare parts using a space plane type of configuration. The engine even ejected properly as expected though the plane hit the ground after clearing the launch guide. I noticed that the nose cone had set slightly off kilter, and possibly the body is too short. No Sim file on this one. I eyeballed it.

Here are two pics that I think sum up what I like most about this hobby.

Happy 4th (a few days late)

I like your taste in shirts. Wish I could find a picture of me in my "flag" tie-dye. We'd coordinate perfectly. :cool:

[bikegod]

I actually made the Tie-Dyes that you see.

In my other life, I fly kites. I fly competitively as a freestyle pilot. My colors (of my kites) are all Red, White and Blue. Stars and Stripes in fact. I needed just the right shirt so I started experimenting. It gets really hot and muggy out here so I bought a 3 dollar muscle tee at Wally world and did the tie-dye thing. Hannah's was her favorite shirt that got ruined from some form of food stain. The dye covered it perfectly.

As the winds die down out here, I find myself tossing both my kite bag and my rocket kit into the car when I go out to play. If it is just too hot and muggy to fly even Super ultra lite kites, then the rockets come out. The Chrome Gemini DC probably was the coolest launch next to the Nu-B1st, though I think I need a shorter delay on the eject charge.

Aim High!

[A Fish Named Wallyum]

I actually made the Tie-Dyes that you see.

In my other life, I fly kites. I fly competitively as a freestyle pilot. My colors (of my kites) are all Red, White and Blue. Stars and Stripes in fact. I needed just the right shirt so I started experimenting. It gets really hot and muggy out here so I bought a 3 dollar muscle tee at Wally world and did the tie-dye thing. Hannah's was her favorite shirt that got ruined from some form of food stain. The dye covered it perfectly.



RUINED by a food stain? You need to tell her that food stains are a "forget-me-not" left by a good meal.
Okay, so I eat like a steam shovel and I'm not all that particular about my appearance.
I got my shirt from an Ebay deal. I get double takes every time I wear it. It and my flag bandana earned me the nickname "Captain America" at work. :cool:

[bikegod]

I would've been more than happy to pay for the right shirt, but I haven't found it yet. I always see someone in a cool patriotic shirt and ask where they got it, but never seem to find it when I go there.

I did some tie-dye for a family trip (8 shirts with a Mickey Mouse shape on the front and a comp generated Disney '05 logo). They came out pretty good (someone even offered to buy mine the last day of our trip). The natural progression was to try the stars and stripes.

Stars not so good, but the RWB is more than acceptable to me. Michaels has the kits, and the big secret is to let the dye sit for 8 hours. The colors come out pretty good.

One of my friends has discovered how to tie-dye ripstop nylon. His fabric fetches a pretty good price to the kitebuilders I fly with.

[Tweener]

What better way to celebrate our country's birthday than blow something up.Right on! Unfortunate that North Korea seems to think so too. :mad: