I finally made the four-hour trip from Round Rock to Seymour, TX for a TNT Launch on Saturday, April 27.
I had prepped "T'Pring's P'Toy" with an H180W and a pair of 0.75 gram ejection charges so that I could maybe tippy-toe in and test my skillz at the Seymour Site before embarrasing myself at the upcoming Texas Shootout over the Memorial Day Weekend.
Saturday the 27th started out OK but turned GREY and WINDY just before I arrived and it gradually got downright nasty with nearby tornados, a little hail and a lot of thunder and lightning and rain.
But thanks to the world famous hospitality of the Tripoli North Texas Club, I had a BLAST anyway back at "The Compound" without ever launching a rocket.
Thanks for all the fun, All'y'All !
I. Will. Be. Back !
Fast forward two weeks ...
The Texas weather has been a little moist the past few weeks, to put it mildly
I FINALLY made the short 90-minute trip to Hearne, TX on May 11 to fly with my two brothers, Mike and Geoff, at the Tripoli Houston Hearne Launch Site.
There were a lot of great flights and a few exciting events, including an M-Motor CATO.
Watching all the rockets land across the fence along the western boundary of the Hearne Muni Airport, I had decided not to fly because I was pretty sure that the 13.8 kV high tension line running parallel to the runway about 1800 ft west of the runway might come into play.
These are potential landing sites I ran Friday afternoon based on an Open Rocket Ground Track Plot:
It is hard to see but the mowed strip at the western end of the lower 'track' at about 1800 feet is the right of way for a 13.8 KV power line.
Then there is the also Little Brazos river that runs west then south of the site -- it was full to the brim and running fast !
Eek !
When I asked about it on the tripolihouston.groups.io mailing list, Jimmy the TH prefect said '... pop your main low to stay in bounds ...'
After watching almost every rocket land on the other side of the western fence, I scrubbed the flight.
But then I let Geoff and Mike convince me to go for it, so I set the Blue Raven to pop the main at 400 ft and got in line to fly her.
This is my usual "GPS Camera Map" photo of T'Pring's P'Toy on the Pad in all her Kilz Primer Glory:
I was showing Geoff how to use the Walston and didn't get my Camera Phone going in time for liftoff, but Jimmy got one for me ( thanks Jimmy ! ).
Here is a little data from the Blue Raven:
This was the maiden voyage for a new Blue Raven, S/N 0829 which I recalibrated Friday eve and flew Active End down.
Site temperature on Sat, May 11 at 14:09 CDT was 83F and 51% relative humidity and the site pressure was 1004.7 mB at the Hearne Airport which is at 275 ft MSL.
The temperature and humidity put the Speed of Sound at 1134 ft/sec.
The wind was blowing about 8 mph -- not enough to keep the skeeters off everyone
I used 0.75 grams of 4F for both drogue and main.
The 1.91 inch diameter x 44.25 inch rocket weighed 968 grams on the pad. Initial Motor mass for the AT H180W was 288 grams, including the 38-to-29 mm adapter. The final motor mass was 160 grams which comes out to 840 grams coast mass.
The motor was an Aerotech H180W, batch 112822-09 and I plugged the forward closure with dog barf and masking tape.
And I flew @Brainstormz123's Comspec Transmitter on 220.235 MHz with my Walston.
I gave my brother Geoff a quick lesson on how to listen to the beeps and turned him loose with the tracker ( he did great ! ).
These are the PAlt, DAlt and IAlt for the entire flight:
Apogee Deployment at 17.8 sec looks a little late compared to the pressure -vs- time track ( max altitude at 14.9 sec ).
I need to ask a few Qs of @Adrian A after Memorial day after he's got his own rocket ready to fly ...
Acceleration vs time during the thrust phase and acceleration vs velocity look smoother this time, compared to the March flight on an H180W:
The rocket flew pretty straight with just a little tilt and roll:
Speed off the 8-foot rail matches Open Rocket very well:
And the 0.75 gram ejection charges look OK for the very tight booster coupler and the nose cone pinned with a 1/16 inch polystyrene rod:
The rocket landed in a Mesquite tree in a little grove of the nasty buggers so there was no breeze where the rocket landed.
We were literally covered with 'skeeters and the rocket has a few blood smears on the Kilz from squashed mosquitos.
I normally take a pic of the rocket as it landed but we were in a rush.
These are Geoff and Mike with the rocket on the ground after Mike climbed up the Mesquite tree and got her down:
And this is the googleearth track with the actual pad and landing spot pinned:
The Comspec is awesome, Alexander -- even my brother Geoff was able to find my rocket after walking a very indirect path around the airport fence and all the muck in the Little Brazos river bottom !
Thanks for listening to my babbling
-- kjh
EDIT: if anyone wants my Blue Raven Data files, give me a shout -- I'll be happy to share them but I am out of space on this post
I had prepped "T'Pring's P'Toy" with an H180W and a pair of 0.75 gram ejection charges so that I could maybe tippy-toe in and test my skillz at the Seymour Site before embarrasing myself at the upcoming Texas Shootout over the Memorial Day Weekend.
Saturday the 27th started out OK but turned GREY and WINDY just before I arrived and it gradually got downright nasty with nearby tornados, a little hail and a lot of thunder and lightning and rain.
But thanks to the world famous hospitality of the Tripoli North Texas Club, I had a BLAST anyway back at "The Compound" without ever launching a rocket.
Thanks for all the fun, All'y'All !
I. Will. Be. Back !
Fast forward two weeks ...
The Texas weather has been a little moist the past few weeks, to put it mildly
I FINALLY made the short 90-minute trip to Hearne, TX on May 11 to fly with my two brothers, Mike and Geoff, at the Tripoli Houston Hearne Launch Site.
There were a lot of great flights and a few exciting events, including an M-Motor CATO.
Watching all the rockets land across the fence along the western boundary of the Hearne Muni Airport, I had decided not to fly because I was pretty sure that the 13.8 kV high tension line running parallel to the runway about 1800 ft west of the runway might come into play.
These are potential landing sites I ran Friday afternoon based on an Open Rocket Ground Track Plot:
It is hard to see but the mowed strip at the western end of the lower 'track' at about 1800 feet is the right of way for a 13.8 KV power line.
Then there is the also Little Brazos river that runs west then south of the site -- it was full to the brim and running fast !
Eek !
When I asked about it on the tripolihouston.groups.io mailing list, Jimmy the TH prefect said '... pop your main low to stay in bounds ...'
After watching almost every rocket land on the other side of the western fence, I scrubbed the flight.
But then I let Geoff and Mike convince me to go for it, so I set the Blue Raven to pop the main at 400 ft and got in line to fly her.
This is my usual "GPS Camera Map" photo of T'Pring's P'Toy on the Pad in all her Kilz Primer Glory:
I was showing Geoff how to use the Walston and didn't get my Camera Phone going in time for liftoff, but Jimmy got one for me ( thanks Jimmy ! ).
Here is a little data from the Blue Raven:
This was the maiden voyage for a new Blue Raven, S/N 0829 which I recalibrated Friday eve and flew Active End down.
Site temperature on Sat, May 11 at 14:09 CDT was 83F and 51% relative humidity and the site pressure was 1004.7 mB at the Hearne Airport which is at 275 ft MSL.
The temperature and humidity put the Speed of Sound at 1134 ft/sec.
The wind was blowing about 8 mph -- not enough to keep the skeeters off everyone
I used 0.75 grams of 4F for both drogue and main.
The 1.91 inch diameter x 44.25 inch rocket weighed 968 grams on the pad. Initial Motor mass for the AT H180W was 288 grams, including the 38-to-29 mm adapter. The final motor mass was 160 grams which comes out to 840 grams coast mass.
The motor was an Aerotech H180W, batch 112822-09 and I plugged the forward closure with dog barf and masking tape.
And I flew @Brainstormz123's Comspec Transmitter on 220.235 MHz with my Walston.
I gave my brother Geoff a quick lesson on how to listen to the beeps and turned him loose with the tracker ( he did great ! ).
These are the PAlt, DAlt and IAlt for the entire flight:
Apogee Deployment at 17.8 sec looks a little late compared to the pressure -vs- time track ( max altitude at 14.9 sec ).
I need to ask a few Qs of @Adrian A after Memorial day after he's got his own rocket ready to fly ...
Acceleration vs time during the thrust phase and acceleration vs velocity look smoother this time, compared to the March flight on an H180W:
The rocket flew pretty straight with just a little tilt and roll:
Speed off the 8-foot rail matches Open Rocket very well:
And the 0.75 gram ejection charges look OK for the very tight booster coupler and the nose cone pinned with a 1/16 inch polystyrene rod:
The rocket landed in a Mesquite tree in a little grove of the nasty buggers so there was no breeze where the rocket landed.
We were literally covered with 'skeeters and the rocket has a few blood smears on the Kilz from squashed mosquitos.
I normally take a pic of the rocket as it landed but we were in a rush.
These are Geoff and Mike with the rocket on the ground after Mike climbed up the Mesquite tree and got her down:
And this is the googleearth track with the actual pad and landing spot pinned:
The Comspec is awesome, Alexander -- even my brother Geoff was able to find my rocket after walking a very indirect path around the airport fence and all the muck in the Little Brazos river bottom !
Thanks for listening to my babbling
-- kjh
EDIT: if anyone wants my Blue Raven Data files, give me a shout -- I'll be happy to share them but I am out of space on this post
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