An Eventful Saturday (2/2): Friends of Amateur Rocketry

After Plane Crazy, my goal was to find the Friends of Amateur Rocketry (FAR) launch. All I knew was that they were at the "East end of Koehn Dry Lake." With a little Googling I was able to find the site in no time. 

I'm hoping to get involved with a project called "Sugar Shot to Space" (SS2S) while I'm out here in Cali. SS2S's goal is to build an amateur rocket that reaches space using good ol' rocket candy for propellant. I'll keep you posted on how involved I get, but for now I recommend checking out their website to learn more: http://sugarshot.org/

As expected, I arrived way late just as everyone was leaving, but it was a fun trip anyway. If I thought I was in the desert before, I was really in the desert now. There were dunes that were drifting up onto the road in places. It felt less like the Mojave and more like the Sahara. 

A view across Koehn Dry Lake.

If this sign was talking about flooding of sand I just might believe it. (Actually flash flooding in the desert is a thing, I guess).

One of FAR's rocket test stands.

They are well equipped with bunkers, buildings, shipping containers and launch towers.

Looking forward to a future event so I can be there for the whole day!

My First LDRS -- First 2 Launch Days

I've had two awesome days at LDRS!!!

It is simply heaven on earth here. There are so many AMAZING projects here. N's and O's are commonplace, and M's are practically ubiquitous. At Tripoli MN, when a level 3 rocket goes up it's the highlight of the whole day. Here at LDRS there have been some level 3's that go up and you look up and say, "hup, there goes another one..."

These first two launch days have been research days, which means that you have to be 18+ and L2 to fly. Experimental home-built motors are permitted (some of which result in spectacular failures). The two guys in the parking spot next to mine (Bill and Bill, a father and son team) put up an experimental N motor, which experienced some major "turbulence" on the way up, and core-sampled on the way down. I don't think they even found it. It probably dug its very own grave and then died in it.

I have flown two rockets now. Neither flight was really successful, but I learned from both experiences. The first day I flew "Exporter 3000," which formerly flew as the longer rocket, "Exporter 2000," on a 2xG80 cluster. Only one motor ignited and the rocket flew off at an angle. I think Blue Thunder propellant is difficult to do with clusters. The plastic parachute ripped off after apogee and the rocket broke a fin on landing. Main  lessons learned: Don't cluster with Blue Thunder and Firstfire Jr. igniters, and a shorter rocket will be affected more by asymmetric thrust than a longer rocket. Just for kicks and grins and giggles I think I'll work out the physics for asymmetric thrust later and write about the results.

I spent the rest of the day spectating, prepping my big project, and meeting other rocketeers. Back at the campground I met some new neighbors, a guy named Marlin and his wife. Fun people. They drove all the way from Texas! Farther than me. Now they look like they're gone. They only stayed one night having driven all the way from Texas? Perhaps they had other business to attend to. The people on the other side of my site are some of the coordinators of the event, and I've been hanging out with them a little. A guy named Larry, a woman named Mary-Beth, and some others. (Lots of little girls).

Today I spent most of the day getting my two-stager ready for flight. It wasn't until about 3pm before it was ready. I had to check and recheck everything just to make absolutely sure that everything was going to work correctly, specifically with the electronics.

Discovery Channel is here doing a special on LDRS. I'll probably appear on TV here an there. Look for the camo hat. I'm constantly wearing it.

When my rocket was finally ready, I started to get the butterflies. The last time I did a two-stager, it was a G to a G, not a K to an I. Last minute I got the idea to hunt down a Discovery person and ask them to put one of their onboard cams on the side of my rocket. I made a persuasive argument. All I had to say was something like "two stages... nine feet tall... 6000 ft..."

The Flight, in Onomatopoeia:

Spshhhhsckcckshchchhhh!
Spkkkkkkkkkkhhhh!
BANG!!
Flutter flutter flutter flutter flutter.

I recovered most of the pieces, which were spread over a half-mile radius. The only piece I couldn't find was the upper stage booster section, along with the staging electronics. Both casings, the altimeter, and most of the debris were recovered. Good news is that the staging worked! Sort of. It's hard to explain with words, so you'll have to wait until I upload a video. Main lessons learned: Double-check burn duration on booster motor. I don't think the booster was done burning before the sustainer fired. Also, USE GOBS AND GOBS of epoxy. Just GOBS isn't good enough.

Full analysis later.

I'm sure you want to see pictures.... Only a few so far! Also there are SO many other cools stories that I'm not remembering at the moment.

Steve Eve's giant Saturn Ib. Unfortunately it's just show and tell, and it won't fly for another month.

Inside: Fancy actuators and a lot of electronics.

Body tube folds out to form fins for the upper stage (in order to keep accurate scale).

Tim Lehr shenanigans. Nuff said.

Anybody else find this picture a little comical? I don't know many rocket scientist Mennonites.

K700BB reload. My selection was limited because AMW reloads are made differently now (More like Cesaroni).

Assembled motor.

Staging electronics.

Blue Thunder propellant added to ematch for extra punch.

Motor retention for I285.

PML Copilot V2.0 for parachute deployment. I have yet to get the data off of it.

Attached some thread to the booster parachute. In theory, when the booster drag separates the thread pulls the parachute out.

Longshot Starkiller on the pad ready to go.

The Discovery camera was found on the ground all by itself.  Incredibly lucky we found it.  I walked with the Discovery people back to their tent and we tried to pull the files off it. It was blank. I honestly wasn't too surprised. It's just a running gag in my life that onboard video never works for me. Ohhhh well.

The motor mount might have been the perpetrator in the accident. I built this rocket a whole year ago, and  might not have used enough epoxy... The current theory for likely mode of failure is that the motor mount dislodged and went through the body tube.

Collecting pieces one by one.

Looking for that last piece reminded me of October Skies. Never found it though, and I don't think Trigonometry is going to help me much.

That's it for now! Soon I'll put together one or more YouTube videos summarizing highlights of the event, my activities, and more!

The Most Amazing Video I Have Ever Seen

Go full screen at 1080p!

A Ladder to Space

A whatta to wha? What do I mean by a ladder to space? Am I going to try to build the World’s Largest Structure Ever Conceived by Man?

DTH Rocket Endeavors’ Ladder to Space – noun: A metaphorical ladder consisting of certain steps I must take in different seasons of life to get to the point where I have the ability to build spacecraft and other Vehicles of Wonder.

As far as I can see, this ladder has 5 rungs:
1) Model rocketry
2) High-power rocketry
3) College
4) Either get a job or start a privately funded aerospace research company, eventually augmenting the resources for step 5
5) Build a spaceship

Step One: Model Rocketry

Model rocketry is currently where I'm at in my ladder. Model rockets are small, lightweight rockets propelled by commercially-manufactured, NAR-certified motors under 160 Newton-seconds (35 pound-seconds) of total impulse (that probably doesn't mean anything to you, but it equates to a type "G" motor). On the low end of the spectrum, model rockets are typically made from a paper tube, balsa wood fins, a plastic nosecone, and are propelled by black powder propellants. On the large end of the spectrum they are usually powered by ammonium perchlorate composite propellants, which is what NASA uses to power the Space Shuttle solid rocket boosters!

Step Two: High-Power Rocketry

This step will probably be the longest process, because it ranges from rockets slightly larger than the ones I'm building now to behemoth monsters that are almost as tall as some baby model rockets can fly! (That might be a slight exaggeration!) There are three levels of high-power rocketry, but I like to think of it as four, because beyond level three you have to build your own motors. Each level is defined by the power of the motors.

Level 1: H - I motors

Level 2: J - L motors

Level 3: M - O motors

Level 4: Research rocketry - Scratch built rocket motors up to size "T." That's 131,072 times larger than any rocket I've built and flown!

Above is a rocket powered by an experimental "S" motor.

Step Three: College

I can't possibly expect to get to space without learning a few things, can I? Next year I will be a Junior in high school (homeschool) so I still have some time to think about it.

Step Four: Undefined

There are zillions of things I could do in this step. I could either get a job with a pre-existing aerospace company, or I could start one. I could build experimental research rockets, join the air force as and aerospace engineer, or anything else that would bequeath to me valuable experience and consolidate my resources.

Step Five: Outer Space

Uh... Why again would I devote my entire life to this? The answer is surprisingly simple: I am fascinated by it. I want to go there. And it's not just outer space that fascinates me, it's the vehicle to get there!