Getting Some New Ideas

We obviously need to have the egg come down much more slowly, so here's the current plan:

We encased the egg in a large, colorful plastic Easter eggshell (like for egg hunts) with its very own streamer. The rest of the rocket is rigged to come down with a parachute. There is nothing in the rules that says the rocket can't come down in two pieces, we only need a streamer on the egg capsule. So the egg capsule/streamer assembly is its own separate entity inside the recovery bay. To ensure that it comes out of the tube upon ejection, we stashed the parachute above the egg capsule so when it deploys it pulls the system out of the recovery bay.

I did some drop tests from a tree today, and it fell 19 feet in 1.42 seconds. That should be more than enough. v=d/t, v=19/1.42 = 13.4 ft/s, t = d/v, t = 825/13.4 = 61 seconds. We're shooting for 40-45 seconds. If it's over, that's GOOD, because it's easier to be under than over when it comes to flight duration with streamer recovery.

Another thing I tried to increase drag was to fold the streamer like an accordian and tie knots in the creases with thread to hold the shape, as in figure 3. This exposes a lot more surface area, plus it flutters better. It should be great.

Figure 1

Figure 2

Figure 3

Hmmmmmmm...

We're getting some interesting results. The first flight was ridiculous.We forgot to drill a hole in the body tube for the altimeter to sense pressure changes, so it told us something ridiculous like 350 ft. The second flight was even ridiculouser. The altimeter gave us a whopping 170 ft. After a thorough inspection, it turned out that SOMEBODY drilled the hole in the wrong end of the body tube, the recovery bay end. That was promptly fixed, and then, after the third flight, we check the altimeter and it's telling us 1621 ft. Are we supposed to believe that, after the junk it's been giving us? Perhaps we're doing something wrong. Well, either way we're doing something wrong, and we have a deadline staring us in the face. AHHHHHH!!! Everybody panic!!!

Didn't Make It

MIT turned me down. It was to be expected. It was inevitable. But at least I tried.

So now the big question is this: Iowa State or Embry-Riddle?

Happy Pi-day!

I just figured something out. MIT is going to be posting admissions decisions at 1:59. It's pi-day. That's the pi-moment. 3/14 at 1:59. And 26 seconds.

3.141592653589793238462643383279502884197169399375105820974944592307....

The suspense is killing me!

Stay Tuned...

March 14th, 2010 at 1:59 pm EDT is a very important moment. It decides my future.

I've applied to MIT, and that is when I find out whether I'm good enough. I certainly hope I make it, but it isn't likely. 10% of the applicants get accepted. Only 6% of last year's accepted applicants had an ACT score of between 26 and 29. Hmmm. It doesn't sound good for me. But you never know. I have an outstanding record in other areas.

How exciting! I can't wait to know where I'm going to be studying next year!

Stay tuned for the upcoming Big Decisions...

Last One to Launch is a Rotten Egg

Take my advice: don't leave your payload couped up inside your rocket for two months. It kinda stinks when you pull it out to inspect it for your next launch. Even the altimeter is stinky. Needless to say, we are going to need a new egg for today's launch (if the weather holds). We don't want any broken rotten eggs on our hands, or in our rocket.

Physics Jokes

• Artificial intelligence is no match for natural stupidity.
• Why did the chicken cross the road? Issac Newton: Chickens at rest tend to stay at rest, chickens in motion tend to cross roads. Albert Einstein: Whether the chicken crossed the road or the road crossed the chicken depends on your frame of reference.
• Q: How many theoretical physicists specializing in general relativity does it take to change a light bulb?
  
  A: Two. One to hold the bulb and one to rotate the universe.
• Does a radioactive cat have 18 half-lives?
• There has been too much action in reaction to political scandals. Please write to your congressman to repeal Newton's third law.
• Rene DesCartes walks into a bar. The bartender looks at him and says "What'll it be? Would you like a beer?" To which DesCartes replies, "I don't think--" POOF! He disappears.
• There is this farmer who is having problems with his chickens. All of the sudden, they are all getting very sick and he doesn't know what is wrong with them. After trying all conventional means, he calls a biologist, a chemist, and a physicist to see if they can figure out what is wrong. So the biologist looks at the chickens, examines them a bit, and says he has no clue what could be wrong with them. Then the chemist takes some tests and makes some measurements, but he can't come to any conclusions either. So the physicist tries. He stands there and looks at the chickens for a long time without touching them or anything. Then all of the sudden he starts scribbling away in a notebook. Finally, after several gruesome calculations, he exclaims, "I've got it! But it only works for spherical chickens in a vacuum."