Remnants

Today was a launch day in Amesbury, MA. While I had anticipated pretty clear skies and low wind, by the time I arrived (late), clouds had rolled in, and the wind was blowing toward the power lines. Not enough to halt the launch, but enough to disallow high power rocket flights.

The winds were slight enough to fly, but chilly, and made me a bit skittish. There were a lot of CATO's today, too, and the whole thing just felt a little spooky.

I had brought a number of rockets which had never flown, including the Estes Saturn V which I finished building before the July 20 anniversary of the Apollo 11 landing, but which I've been unable to get off the pad for one reason or another.

My first attempt was thwarted by the extreme heat. The launch was called short before I got the chance to get my Saturn on the pad.

The second time I took my Saturn to a launch, the shoulder of the upper section had grown tight. I was worried it wouldn't come off, that there would be no parachutes, and that the whole beautiful thing would come in ballistic and smash to pieces on the ground.

I took it home and worked on the shoulder until it could slide in and out of the rocket without too much force.

Last month, I was finally going to fly the Saturn, but as I was setting it up on the launch pad, the string holding the upper portion's recovery system broke. It was too short to re-tie it on the field, so I had to come home without flying it once again.

Today, after all that, the wind had me worried, and though I want to see how this rocket flies, I wasn't willing to launch it if I was likely to lose the upper section. "Go fever" has caused me to lose a number of rockets I worked really hard on, so I've learned to say no if the weather isn't feeling right.

So, I didn't fly much today - not the Saturn V, nor a number of other unflown builds.

I started with the N00b T00b, its second flight. The first flight, in October, should have been low risk. I only put it up on an A8-3! But I had a PerfectFlite Firefly altimeter on board, and the nose cone wasn't tight enough, so at apogee, the nose and altimeter both popped out of the rocket and I didn't see where they fell! I found the nose cone later, as it had landed right at the base of Pad 7, which I was assigned for my to-be-aborted Saturn flight. The altimeter never turned up, despite my combing the area. Good thing they're pretty inexpensive.

Today's N00b T00b flight went better. No altimeter, but a high flight on a B6-4, and the nose stayed on.

I also flew my Estes Photon Probe on a B6-4, a nice flight with a nice motor. I used to put C's or nothing in my rockets, but the last few years I've learned to really appreciate the B motor.

I'd have flown more B stuff, but I didn't bring anything that small, and realized I'd left my motor adapters at home. There were one or two things I'd have been willing to fly on a D12-5, but I didn't have a spacer, and the motor tubes were too long.

Finally, the weather cleared, and the wind died down a bit, and I though I should have a bit more guts. There was only 45 minutes left in the launch, so I didn't want to do anything too complicated (like attaching the metric rail I'd brought for some of my rockets to the high power pad), but I felt pretty good about putting up my Estes Leviathan on an F26-6 composite motor.

Because I built the Leviathan for my high power level 1 certification flight, I of course way overbuilt it. It's heavy and wouldn't go too high on an F26. That, and the Jolly Logic Chute Release, and the fact that the Leviathan is just... big... made me feel it was unlikely I'd lose it.

I think this was only the third flight of the Leviathan since I'd built it. Maybe fourth.

I taped a camera to its side and filmed the launch from the ground. The F26 is a fun motor. The flight was great. Chute Release performed perfectly. Of course my Rocketry Show MacBook Air doesn't recognize the little camera I had taped to the side of the rocket, but once I figure out how to get the video off of it, it should be a fun little short video.

After the site was broken down, I combed the area again, wondering if maybe I'd stumble across that Firefly altimeter I'd lost over a month ago. You never know. You can find all sorts of things at regular launch sites, even years later. Someone today found an Estes Mosquito they'd lost in early October, in perfect shape, so anything's possible.

I didn't find the altimeter, but I did come across the remnants of an old CATO. A damp, spongy blue propellant grain from a 38mm composite motor which must have been here since at least last month. Probably the nozzle blew out and the fuel grain fell out, unburned. It had sat there unnoticed, blending in with the ground, till I saw the unusual shape and kicked at it with my boot to reveal the blue grain.

There's one more launch this year, in two weeks. This time, I'll prepare better, ahead of time, go early, and see if I can't get that Saturn off the ground.

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