KCAR Launch Report: March Sport Launch

Launch date and time: March 16th, 2005 at 11:00A.M.
Launch location: Tickwood Ranch
Launch wind and weather: 6 to 10 MPH winds and 50 degree temps.

For once we had a nice day although a tad bit cool. Light winds helped keep most rockets and gliders close to the pad area.

We had several new guests show up and fly their rockets. The Clark family showed up and got off quite a few flights between all of them. The Tung family also made a very impressive showing. It was very nice to see new members showing up with such nice rockets. We will be anxious to see more rockets from both of these new families. Also I believe both families are new club members.

Dave Lucas Flew his Wild goose, which is made from party favor blow horns as well as his Penny rocket. It is made from 3x5 cards and costs about $.01 to make. Very nice flying rocket, and a very neat idea from one of our club members. Dave Lucas also had a couple of good Glider flights including one, which had a hang time of probably 1.5 hours. It managed to JUST barely catch itself in the VERY top of a tree. Almost like Charlie Browns kite eating tree. At the very end of the day the entire remaining crew spent about 15-20 min’s throwing sticks at the very top of the tree in an effort to retrieve Dave L’s glider. Finally the proper branch, with the proper trajectory, with the proper speed was launched and the glider was finally out of the tree as daylight was fading.

Dave Bucher got in quite a few flights as well as an attempt to fly his Saturn V with a Five-engine cluster. All were looking forward to this flight and those of us who had seen it before were really looking forward to it. Unfortunately without knowing it the launch battery had dropped in voltage and it wasn't quite up to the task of lighting 5 igniters. The Sat V launched with only 2 out of 5 motors burning and so it ended up in a slow motion crash. Fortunately very little damage was done and we will expect to see more flights from Dave's work.

Martin and Christian got several flights in as well as a couple of drag races.

As some of you know, I (Alan S) have recently been bitten by the R/C rocket boosted glider bug. I showed up with two gliders ready to fly, An Estes Astro-Blaster and a Klingberg flying wing. The Astro-Blaster had a very short flight due to low power since this is a very heavy glider. Also before and more glider flights I will be investing in a 12-foot long launch rail. The gliders need to have a longer time before being released to fly on their own. However the Klingberg wing is able to use a shorter rod without too much of a problem. One other nice feature of R/C gliders is the short turn around time so I was able to fly the K-wing one after another. I did have one CATO that split the engine tube, but I was able to buy a new engine tube and nose cone from Martin and with a little surgery and 5 min epoxy it was ready for flight again with in about a half hour. The wing lifts off and then wants to pitch over to almost level flight. Usually all it takes is a small input to aim it straight up and it then climbs without needing to touch the controls. I managed to get 7 flights out of the wing and was actually starting to feel a bit comfortable at the end of the day. It takes a gentle touch when under power or you can spend the next few seconds franticly trying to get it leveled back out. Also it is veeerry pitch sensitive when in a turn. It wants to dive when you try to turn it. That made landings a bit tricky until I figured out its tendencies. Also once while figuring out that little item the wing made quite the splashdown into a pond. A nice feature of a hollow balsa wing covered with a plastic covering is that it floats real nice. So with a quick drying out and cleaning it was ready to fly again in minutes. Unfortunatly at the end of the day I tried to fly on a D-12 staged to another D-12 It started to pitch down and when I added a bit of up and it was a bit too much. I spent the next several seconds franticly trying to keep the still under power wing from hitting anything. But it did manage to come in contact with the ground while still thrusting and it snapped 2/3rds of the right wing off. But as I type this launch report it is in the repair shop and the wing was reattached as of last night.

All in all the turnout was a bit light but it was a very nice day and some nice rockets were seen in the sky. Look forward to seeing you at a later launch.

Submitted by Alan Shaffmaster

There was 1 staged flight(s) (49), and 2 clustered flight(s) (28, 31).

Flight Log

Flight #	Flier	Rocket	Motor(s)	Comments
1	Christian Bruggeman	SpaceShipOne	A8-3	More motor!
2	Emma Clark	Quark	1/2A3-4T	Lost!
3	Tom Clark	Gnome	1/2A3-4T	Separation
4	Nathan Herscovici	Space Bus	A3-4T
5	Chuck Herscovici	Shuttle Express	A8-3
6	Paul Tung	Fat Boy	C6-3
7	Robert Tung	Blu-97	C6-3
8	Chuck Herscovici	Vega/Scratch Built	C6-3	Took a bath
9	Emma Clark	Fat Pig	B6-2
10	Dave Lucas	Nike Smoke	B6-4	Right to Emma
11	Robert Tung	Nasa Starship	C6-5
12	Bob Clark	Wizard	A8-5
13	Robert Tung	Black Diamond	C6-5	To the sky - lost
14	Tom Clark	Viking	A8-3
15	Emma Clark	Red Heart	A8-5	Second year around!
16	Dave Lucas	Wild Goose	C6-3	Nice party rocket
17	Robert Tung	Blu-97	C6-3
18	Dave Lucas	Penny Rocket	A8-3
19	Robert Tung	Fat Boy	C6-3
20	Emma Clark	Fat Pig	C6-3
21	Tom Clark	Viking	B6-4
22	Alan Shaffmaster	Kling Wing	D12-P
23	Robert Tung	Honest John	D12-3
24	Alan Shaffmaster	Kling Wing	E9-P	CATO! Will rebuild.
25	Robert Tung	Honest John	D12-3
26	Christian Bruggeman	Fiesta II	B6-4
27	Dave Lucas	A Little VOD	1/2A3-2T
28	Dave Bucher	Estes Saturn V	5 X C6-3	Only two lit Return to top
29	Robert Tung	Nasa Starship	C6-5
30	Robert Tung	Honest John	D12-3
31	Dave Bucher	Estes Patriot	4 X D12-5	Return to top
32	Dave Lucas	Atom-X Jr	C6-3
33	Lance Fischer	Barracuda II	F21-8	Great motor! Slight drift.
34	Martin Ashwill	Estes Drifter Clone	A8-3
35	Alan Shaffmaster	Kling Wing	E9-P
36	Martin Ashwill	Estes Drifter Clone	A8-3
37	Martin Ashwill	Estes Drifter Clone	A8-3
38	Alan Shaffmaster	Astro Blaster	D12-P	Nice landing
39	Dave Bucher	Spot Landing Max	A8-3
40	Alan Shaffmaster	Kling Wing	D12-P
41	Dave Lucas	Liberator	C6-3
42	Martin Ashwill	Estes Drifter Clone	B6-4	Drag Race! 6.37S
43	Dave Bucher	Estes Drifter Clone	B6-4	Drag Race! 5.61S
44	Alan Shaffmaster	Kling Wing	E9-P
45	Alan Shaffmaster	Kling Wing	E9-4
46	Dave Bucher	Spot Landing Max	C6-5
47	Dave Bucher	Spot Landing Max	C6-5
48	Dave Bucher	Estes SpaceShipOne	C6-3
49	Alan Shaffmaster	Kling Wing	D12-0 to E9-P	Very good flight Return to top
50	Dave Lucas	Vampire	B4-2	Tech Demo Flight
51	Dave Lucas	Zephyr	C6-3	Has not touched down yet. Still in the air!

Bob and Emma Clark Photo by Christian Bruggeman	Flights by Rocketeers Flights Rocketeer(s) 9 Robert Tung 8 Dave Lucas Alan Shaffmaster 7 Dave Bucher 4 Martin Ashwill Emma Clark 3 Tom Clark 2 Christian Bruggeman Chuck Herscovici 1 Bob Clark Lance Fischer Nathan Herscovici Paul Tung
Dave is wiring the cluster ignitors on his Saturn V Photo by Christian Bruggema	Rockets Making Multiple Flights: Flights Rocket Rocketeer 7 Kling Wing Alan Shaffmaster 4 Estes Drifter Clone Martin Ashwill 3 Spot Landing Max Dave Bucher Honest John Robert Tung 2 Fat Pig Emma Clark Viking Tom Clark Blu-97 Robert Tung Nasa Starship
Robert and his father load up their Honest John Photo by Christian Bruggeman	Totals by motor: Motor Number Flown Impulse (Newtons) 1/2A3 3 3.27 Total 1/2A’s: 3 3.27 A3 1 2.22 A8 10 23.20 Total A’s: 11 25.42 B4 1 4.29 B6 6 25.98 Total B’s: 7 30.27 C6 21 185.22 Total C’s: 21 185.22 D12 11 185.24 Total D’s: 11 185.24 E9 5 139.35 Total E’s: 5 139.35 F21 1 60.45 Total F’s: 1 60.45 Total: 59 629.22 (I)
Robert and Paul at the launch controls Photo by Christian Bruggeman
Alan’s Klingberg Wing just after launch Photo by Christian Bruggeman	Dave’s Saturn at ignition Photo by Christian Bruggeman

Write-up by Alan Shaffmaster
Data by Christian Bruggeman NAR 82573
HTML code and code generating scripts by Tim Burger NAR 78486 L1

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Page created on June 11, 2005.