Launch Report for Saturday, March 27th, 1999

My father & I headed out to the schoolyard of Howard S. Billings Regional High School here in Chateauguay, Quebec, Canada a little after 8:30 in the morning.  To the launch site, I brought my Estes Maxi Alpha 3, Python, Quark, Der Big Red Max, Reliant, and Sky Raider as well as my scratch built Warthog and Arrow rockets.

The weather was good, visibility excellent, and there was a slight breeze coming in from the west on this nearly cloudless day.   Temperature was around 10 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.   Since I got robbed on March 1st, I couldn't bring my video camera to record each flight as I normally do.

Flight 131, 6th flight this year
Estes Gnome 001 on an Apogee 1/4A2-2 for its 3rd flight
First to go up was Gnome at 8:48 AM on an Apogee 1/4A2-2 with a 13mm to 10.5mm adaptor that I made myself.  This was my first use of an Apogee motor and my first use of a 1/4A for that matter.  Performance was great with lots of tracking smoke with a delay time that actually matched what was stamped on the motor.  I sent Gnome up on a 1/4A to gauge the wind and of course to try out my Apogee motors.

Flight 132, 7th flight this year
Estes Quark on an Apogee 1/4A2-2 for its 1st flight
Next up was Quark at 8:59 AM on its maiden flight on another Apogee 1/4A2-2 motor.  Beautiful flight and I actually got the rocket back too!  One thing that troubled me was that Quark is supposed to have featherweight recovery, but once the motor and adaptor ejected from the rocket, it nosed over and lawn darted at very high speed.  Not especially safe!  Again, the Apogee motor performed great just like in the previous flight.   I lost the motor casing with its adaptor and it wasn't until the end of the launch day that my father found it.

Flight 133, 8th flight this year
Estes Der Big Red Max on an Estes B4-2 for its 2nd flight
Der Big Red Max was up next at 9:03 AM on an Estes B4-2.  The boost was straight as an arrow... so straight in fact that when it reached apogee it started falling back down backwards just before the ejection charge went off.  There were few tiny holes in the parachute since I probably didn't use quite enough wadding.  This was my first use of a B4-2 motor.  Its seems to work really well for this rocket.

Flight 134, 9th flight this year
Estes Maxi Alpha 3 01 on an Estes D12-3 for its 6th flight
Maxi Alpha 3 on an Estes D12-3 was up next at 9:13 AM and it did its usual spin on its way up due to the warped fins, but otherwise it flew well.  This rocket gets a lot of attention since it's big and loud!

Flight 135, 10th flight this year
Estes Reliant on an Estes B6-4 for its 4th flight
Reliant was up next on an Estes B6-4 at 9:22 AM.  I was hoping to use Reliant to use up the rest of my C6-5's from a 12 year old Blast-Off Flight Pack, but the winds carried Reliant a little too far on a B6-4 to risk using "C"'s on it.

Flight 136, 11th flight this year
Scratch built Arrow on an Apogee 1/4A2-2 for its 1st flight
Just the night before, I built Arrow in anticipation of using the Apogee micro motors the next day.  I was worried about this one since the fins are very small and my experience told that this one would likely be marginally stable or possibly even unstable.  RockSim said it would be stable so I put it to the test and sent it up on my last Apogee 1/4A2-2 at 9:30 AM.   It left a bit of a wavy smoke trail, but I discovered that one of the fins wasn't quite straight afterwards and this is likely what caused the smoke trail.

Flight 137, 12th flight this year
Estes Python on an Estes C6-3 for its 1st flight
Python went up next on its maiden flight on an Estes C6-3 in a homemade 24mm to 18mm adaptor at 9:37 AM.  It didn't go very fast or very high and it weathercocked into the wind, but I was afraid to send it up on a "D" for fear of losing it.

Flight 138, 13th flight this year
Estes Der Big Red Max on an Estes C6-5 for its 3rd flight
Der Big Red Max went up again, this time on a 12 year old Estes C6-5 at 9:42 AM.  It arced over before chute deployment which I pretty much expected from a rocket this big on a C6-5, but I figured I'd try it since it was a recommended motor for this rocket when they were still making it, and after all... I still had to burn off all those old "C"'s!

Flight 139, 14th flight this year
Estes Sky Raider on an Estes B6-4 for its 3rd flight
Sky Raider was up next on an Estes B6-4 in the same 24mm to 18mm adaptor that flew in Python just before.   Sky Raider went up at 9:51 AM and it was a nice boost although it landed quite a bit farther from the pad than I expected it to.

Flight 140, 15th flight this year
Scratch built Jupiter 1 on an Estes A10-3T for its 4th flight
Jupiter 1 was back for another flight after it lost its nose cone, streamer, and shock cord in its February flight.  It was fitted with a new nose cone and a new type of streamer material that was made in Ukraine that I bought from Sigma Rockets.  It has a mirrored surface on one side so it reflects brightly in the sky and makes it a lot easier to track the rocket.   Jupiter 1 went up on an Estes A10-3T in my homemade 18mm to 13mm adaptor at 9:58 AM and broke two fins on landing.   The landing was slow enough so I suspect that the fins probably got cracked when it tumbled out of the sky in February and today's flight just weakened them further.

Flight 141, 16th flight this year
Estes Maxi Alpha 3 01 on an Estes D12-3 for its 7th flight
I sent Maxi Alpha 3 up again on an Estes D12-3 at 10:04 AM to gauge the current wind conditions in anticipation of a possible launch on an Aerotech E15-4W.  It landed well enough within the recovery area that I felt I could try a flight on an "E"...

Flight 142, 17th flight this year
Estes Maxi Alpha 3 01 on an Estes D12-3 for its 8th flight
And then the damn E15 wouldn't fit into the motor mount!!  I guess it was because the motor mount had expanded from the previous launch and needed time to cool and also, the black Aerotech motor casings probably expanded a little in the sun as well.  In the end, I had to settle for another flight on an Estes D12-3.  It went up at 10:11 AM and it broke two fins at the root on landing when the chute simply refused to open.

Questions? Comments? Suggestions? Just to say Hi?

E-mail: kbedard@rocketryonline.com

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