Yes Menford Sutton was the oner/operator of Coaster Corp. along with a Continental Airlines pilot friend, named Gene Dickerson.

Its my understanding from speaking with Mr. Sutton and verifying the content of the conversation with Randy Liebermann, that the original Coaster motors were basiclaly pyrotechnic black powder skyrocket motors.

Orginally they did not have either a delay train or ejection charge'; if you know anything about black powder skyrocket motors, they have above the Core a variable length section called a "heading". This heaidng was made from the same black powder charge as the propellant grain; they were one and the same.

So when the engine core burned out, the heading fucntioned a dual purpose: it acted first as a delay train, and then as an ejection charge, blowing out the parachute.

Orv Carlisle took this basic pyrotechnic BP skyrocket idea, and used a an actual delay train (also make from BP) along with an ejection charge,; now the difference here of course is that the Carlisle delay train/ejection charge was specially formulated Bp to better their inteneded fucntion as a delay train/ejetcion charge.

The major differnce betwen the Coaster and Carlisle/Brown motors was of course the Coasters were Core burning while the Carlisle motors were endburners with a slight core.

In pyrotechnics, there are basically 2 types of rocket motors: the Cored Skyrocket and a lesser know variant called a Driver or Wheel Driver; these were never intended in their original use to propel rockets into the air; instead they were used as "wheel" drivers; ie they rotated pyrotechnic wheels. These Driver's were end burning in nature.

The clay nozzles of both from what I can determine were simple cylindrical nozzles.

The Coasters were retrofitted to use an actual delay train/ejection charge at some point after the Carlisle, Brown manufactured Rock-A-Chutes, were introduced to the market by MMI.

hth

terry dean
nar 16158

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"Old Rocketeer's don't die; they just go OOP".....unless you 3D print them.