4-22-06 Pickrell, NE
Our first launch of the year was with Thor in Nebraska. Weather forecast was for perfect weather, clear skies, low to mid 70's and low wind. As it turned out they were finally right.
Forgetting our chairs and thinking we wouldn't need our awning we had to improvise on our setup a little bit but we made it work.
We started off prepping two rockets. Tannor wanted the Screamin Mimi to go up so that one was prepped and I also got by BSD Sprint ready to go up.
Lifting off on an AT H97 Black Jack.
This thing has always been an extremely straight flyer, and since we had just a little bit of wind out of the east I elected to tilt the rail slightly to the east. I guess I wasn't thinking about the lower thrust of the black jack motor and we actually weather cocked a bit after it left the rail.
On the way up and angling to the east. The flight trajectory wasn't the best but wasn't bad, ejection on the medium delay was a second or two late however I think if I'd a flown it straight up like I should have it would have been right on.
Well I was read the riot act after launching that one and not launching the Screamin Mimi first so we had to hurry up and get it on the pad.
Screamin Mimi lifting off on a D12-5. Liftoff was good and straight on this one.
If you listened carefully after burnout you could hear the whistles going too. A nice flight up and a good recovery close.
While we were prparing our next flights we watched some others go up.
I believe from memory this was a Loc weasel with a nice red, white, and blue paint job going up on a G64 for a nice flight and recovery.
Again from memory, this was a scratch built 4" diameter bird lifting off on a G64.
You can see it starting here, it immediately after coming up off the bad turned to the left, with the wind.
Here's it's really turned a bit and is accelerating off.
About it's final trajectory here, and it raced off, not quite a land shark but definately not an optimal trajectory.
A nice liftoff on this black and white bird.
This was the first drag race of the day, unfortunately only one bird got off. The black and orange rocket is one of Thomas Kernes' birds taking off for a nice flight here. The other two V2's were loaded with I600's and burnt the ignitors but didn't light. They were going to try again later.
Almost an old standby at the launches now is Larry Mills' 2" PML Amraam lifting off on an AT I200.
As usual this thing ripped off the pad for a nice flight and actually recovered nice and close.
Next up was Don Rice with an all fiberglass bird lifting off on a Loki Research L1400. Unfortunately it blew the nozzle out when it came up to pressure. The rocket lifted up off the rail to about 50 or 60 feet then turned around and came right back down.
Didn't appear that it had even gotten high enough to arm the electronics or they just didn't have time as nothing deployed and it stuck right back into the ground. Unfortunately the fiberglass nosecone was pushed well into the top body tube and was still stuck there last time I saw it, that was the only damage.
Next up for us was our Cosmodrome Black Brandt 2 that was damaged last year. Having made repairs over the winter it was time to get it back up in the air.
Lifting off with an AT G64.
Climbing up and away for a nice flight and recovery, the 7 second delay was right on and it recovered with no damage to any of the balsa parts.
It was time to try that drag race again.
Don't know what changes they made to the ignitors but this time they got it to go, you can see the V2 on the left is clearly in the lead.
And here you can see the middle V2 was a bit late. Nice flights on all three birds.
We were ready for our next flight with our BSD 38 Special. We set it up for dual deploy and loaded up an AT J350.
On the pad and coming up to pressure this bird really moves out on the J350's. It's been flown twice now and each time on the J350.
Moved out so quick this is all I got in the second frame of the burst of pics. Very straight and nice flight and dual deploy handled by the MissileWorks RRC2 went off without a hitch with the main coming out at 500'. Unfortunately my altimeter lost power at some point after the main and I lost the altitude. The last flight however was just shy of 5,000'.
Thomas Kernes' rocket going up on a CTI K510, this is an awesome motor with a nice 5 second burn. Unfortunately the upper body tube came loose some how and landed on it's own receiving some damage, however it sounded like it was going to be an easy fix and it will be back out.
If anyone would like full size/un-edited pics just email me and let me know and I'd be glad to send them to you, and if you know any of the specifics about any of the unknown birds please let me know. Thanks.