Launch Report for Saturday, February 27th, 1999

After being unable to attend the group launch of the Association Astronautique Amateur du Québec today, I was determined to get a few flights off of my own and so my father & I headed out to the immense schoolyard of Howard S. Billings High School here in Chateauguay, Quebec, Canada at around 12:30PM EST to send up what was to be a large number of rockets on multiple flights, but increasing winds kept today's launch down to only five flights. I brought my Estes Wizard 01 (my first of two Wizards), Alpha III 02 (my second of two Alpha III's), Ninja, Maxi Alpha 3, Sky Raider, Red Storm, Bandit, Quest Big Rage, and my scratchbuilt Pyramid and Jupiter 1.

The weather was good, visibility excellent, and there was a slight breeze coming in from the west. Temperature was pretty cold being around 3 degrees Celsius.

I used my Estes Porta Pad that came with my Airwalker starter kit since there was a bit of wind and I needed a launch pad with a tilter to adjust the launch angle. As with previous flights since I became a BAR, I tried to exhaust the remaining motors in my twelve year old Estes Blast-off Flight Pack as well as other motors that I still had left over from that era. I brought my video camera to record every flight.

Flight 126, 1st flight this year
Estes Alpha III 02 on an Estes 1/2A6-2 for its 2nd flight



The first rocket to go up was my Estes Alpha III 02 on an Estes 1/2A6-2 at 1:26PM EST for a wind test to get an idea of how far I could expect the rest of my rockets to drift. It flew well, but the parachute didn't open and it came down hard, but with no damage. The first rocket to fly today was supposed to be my Wizard 01, but the streamer felt quite brittle being nearly 18 years old at the time of this writing and I was having trouble fitting it loosely into the airframe so I decided not to push a bad position and I sent up Alpha III 02 instead.

Flight 127, 2nd flight this year
Estes Ninja 01 on an Estes 1/2A3-2T for its 2nd flight


Next up was my Estes Ninja on an Estes 1/2A3-2T at 1:32PM EST for another wind test since the chute on the Alpha III 02 didn't open. Great flight and it still surprises me to see just how high this rocket goes on a 1/2A. Again, no damage.



My Estes Red Storm was up next on an Estes B6-4 at 1:43PM EST. This was my first purchase and flight of an RTF (Ready To Fly) rocket and considering how much of a bad rap RTF rockets have been getting lately in terms of quality and reliability, Red Storm was a pleasant surprise since its flight was picture perfect. My only concern is that the shock cord mount is deep inside the rocket right in front of the motor and the shock cord is bound to give out sooner or later after being repeatedly exposed to ejection gases without any protection. I'll be moving the shock cord mount towards the front of the rocket as is typical with Estes kits just to be safe.

Flight 129, 4th flight this year
Scratch built Jupiter 1 on an Estes B6-4 for its 3rd flight



Next up was my scratchbuilt Jupiter 1 on an Estes B6-4 at 1:50PM EST. This is the most powerful motor Jupiter 1 has flown on so far and this was its first flight since 1986. I never dreamed it would fly so damn high & fast!! Unfortunately, the shock cord separated and I lost the nose cone, but I recovered the airframe. It's strange because I was certain that I wouldn't recover any part of the rocket and even my video suggested that the airframe would have nosed over and core sampled at least a thousand feet from where it actually did. I just happened to see the airframe lying in the distance in exactly the opposite direction where I would have expected it to have come down. The rocket sailed out of sight though and the video only revealed the puff of smoke from the ejection charge. The airframe didn't even core sample though which leads me to believe that it tumbled back down and the wind carried it back into the recovery area. I guess God decided to give me a break on this one! The Apogee nose cone that this rocket used is gone forever though. It's a good thing I still have at least half a dozen more! :-)




	Last to go up was my Quest Big Rage on an Estes B6-2 at 2:02PM EST. This was my first use ever of a B6-2 motor. As with the first Big Rage flight in December of last year, some parachute lines separated from the parachute and again, it's likely because of the cold. In fact every line on the payload section's parachute separated except for one and the payload section pranged into the ground only about ten feet in front of my father. It hit with enough force to shred three inches of the payload section along the spiral windings. I'm going to modify Big Rage to come down with airframe & payload section together on a single parachute since that payload section is a lethal weapon if the 'chute fails. The photos at left show details of the damage to Big Rage's payload section.

Time at Liftoff:
Flight Duration in Seconds:	11
Distance from Launch Pad in Feet:

Time at Liftoff:
Flight Duration in Seconds:	~9
Distance from Launch Pad in Feet:	~300

Time at Liftoff:
Flight Duration in Seconds:	~10
Distance from Launch Pad in Feet:

Time at Liftoff:
Flight Duration in Seconds:	11
Distance from Launch Pad in Feet:

Time at Liftoff:
Flight Duration in Seconds:	26
Distance from Launch Pad in Feet: