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Posted: 12/4/2002 6:09:04 PM EDT
I built this about three years ago. I wanted to launch it into a thunderhead with a tethered conductor or initiate a lightning strike.

It was build to accept a 57mm hybrid motor, which has the impulse to take this large object up to 6,000 ft+. I did a lot of modeling and research on the propulsion.

The problem is to get BATF permission to purchase the motor I need to go to a Tripoli club and take a course. If I remember right, the closest one is in SC.

Even so, with 9/11, Carswell Naval Base, the FAA residing here, and several airports within a very short distance it’ll never happen where I live now. You obviously would need to airport permission well in advance.

Just wondering if anyone here ever dabbled in the hobby.

On a side note, the background is the corner of my "armory", and hobby room where I also post on ARFCOM. Feel free to add your hobby room pics, if it takes off i'll change the title.

[img]http://www.hunting-pictures.com/members/Boomholzer/rocket.jpg[/img]
Link Posted: 12/4/2002 6:21:10 PM EDT
[#1]
cool.

I did the Estes thing when in grade school. I still have one of the rockets here somewhere.

I checked into a ~high power rocketry  magazine a while back**, looks pretty impressive with the massive size of some of those.  Speed was pretty neat and I seen some carrying camera payloads.  Motor sizes are pretty impressive too [:)]

Alas, yet another hobby that requires mo-money then I's got to do what I'd like to do. (like Astronomy)


I think they have a couple launches here in Colorado, out east of Colorado Springs IIRC, during the summer.   I'd like to at least go see one, along with an EOSS (edge of space science) Balloon (high altitude) balloon launch.


** What ever magazine it is that the Tripoli rocketry assoc. puts out.


[red]adding-  I seem to recall that some people were using BOWLING BALLS as payload..???  [/red]
Link Posted: 12/4/2002 6:26:05 PM EDT
[#2]
converting impulse, I calculated that some motors could lift the ass-end of a car off the ground!
Link Posted: 12/4/2002 6:26:22 PM EDT
[#3]
Link Posted: 12/4/2002 6:29:35 PM EDT
[#4]
Link Posted: 12/4/2002 6:43:10 PM EDT
[#5]
I had a Centurian (or maybe Estes) space shuttle that I built in 1972 or something like that. It started with 3 "C" engines in parallel, but then I got the bright idea of using 3 "D" engines in series. So, I launched the damn thing at the dry lake in SoCal, it went about 15 feet in the air and went horizontal. Everyone hit the dirt and after a few seconds of flight it rammed into the side of some guy's trailer. He was pissed.

So, no, I have no experience with the big dogs. Hmmm... perhaps this is a hobby I should revisit? Sounds cheaper than guns.
Link Posted: 12/4/2002 6:45:16 PM EDT
[#6]
I want to do it. I have access to equipment and the knowledge to measure charge potential between the earth and ground to give it the best shot.

I had a open communique with a university research scientist who actually did just that several times.

Unfortunately, my rocket is a bit to massive. More sucessful transportation uses a design simular to a bottle rocket with no hollow tube for the middle fuselage.

I researched using conductive dopes in the solid/gas motor instead of a tether in hopes of bettering the university geeks. Wven without the benefit of experimentation, I think that approach is unplausable.

If it ever happens ILIKELEGS: you'll be my AV guy.

Link Posted: 12/4/2002 6:45:44 PM EDT
[#7]
Quoted:
Dude !!!

If you ever try to make lightning strike with
that or anything else, give me a call so I can
photograph it. I have around 300 lightning photos right now.
View Quote


Let me know too! I've never seen anyone get electrocuted! [;)]
Link Posted: 12/4/2002 6:50:57 PM EDT
[#8]
I used to do 'fly by wire' "guided" Estes rockets with a homemade bang in the payload (pops gunpowder and a ingenious 12ga primer initiating system). You get a neat effect when you put slack in the guide wire. It looks as if the rocket has itelligence to hit the target.

Im a lightning freak. I've been blessed to witness ball-lightning on 2 occasions. Alot of scientists argue it does not exsist. Very cool!
Link Posted: 12/4/2002 6:57:52 PM EDT
[#9]
Hmmm... That gives me an idea. I wonder if anyone has tried RF? [thinking]

We was too po to afford that hi tech stuff as kids, but now it's a different story. he he Although, we used to by the ingredients to make gun power at the local drug store back in the 60's. I doubt you can do that today.
Link Posted: 12/4/2002 7:01:06 PM EDT
[#10]
RF?
To guide the rocket? High freq RF design for wireless telecom is my profession so i got some knowledge there.
Link Posted: 12/4/2002 7:08:55 PM EDT
[#11]
Why the hell not? All you need are servos to control the control surfaces and you're in like flint.

I always thought it would be fun to build a "beam rider" of sorts. When I was at General Dynamics in 1980, I was involved in the Navy's Standard Missile project, which was a beam riding anti-aircraft missile, meaning it followed a radar beam to the target. It had no real guidance itself (until later versions, I think later in the 80's).

So, why not build a "beam rider" that rides the the beam produced by a laser rangefinder or something like that? As long as you could focus it real tight.

Sh*t, this sounds like an expensive hobby. he he
Link Posted: 12/4/2002 7:24:26 PM EDT
[#12]
Cloud to cloud kicks ass. Great photo.

mattja,
Operation and manipulation of the control surfaces is cake. The control surface position sensors & feedback control for human & non-human flight control is a different story. Now were into REAL rocket scientist stuff!!!
Even with better than marginal vertical stability and minimal control surface variation, I don't think a ground perspective pilot could offer control under load to that altitude. Hence the bulkiness and minimum fin surfaces.

I did sketch out a way to keep the thing vertical by using a 2 sets (forward and aft) of high gained, differential pairs of Analog Device's accelerometers. They are actually capable of measuring the earth's mag field (roughly parallel to the surface)! cool stuff! I know it works for horizontal flight so I just adapted it. Problem is that with a peak of 13g's of thrust it will mess up my amateur analog flight control if the sensors are not perfectly aligned to the hull. Also, the proportionally higher forward acceleration will can the small-G sensitivity needed for vertical guided control.

Again designing that circuit was not all that hard. Integrating it to slow ass servos is a different story!!!
Link Posted: 12/4/2002 7:33:10 PM EDT
[#13]
Hybrid motor? Solid fuel/liquid oxidizer? Would that be something you'd have to make or does someone make such a thing. I'm really into rocketry but am still buying my engines from the hobby store, not making them as I know some people do.
Link Posted: 12/4/2002 7:37:35 PM EDT
[#14]
BTW: Brou, whats in all those cans??? [:D]

AS,
yep, do a search on 57mm Hybrid (and that is not the biggest). Kick-ass thrust ability!


Mattja,

I'm not sure how a fixed ground laser would work without involving GPS and ground telemetry. Again, we are more into a war device. Simply "letting her fly" will work in this application.
Link Posted: 12/4/2002 7:46:12 PM EDT
[#15]
Quoted:
........Although, we used to by the ingredients to make gun power at the local drug store back in the 60's. I doubt you can do that today.
View Quote


In some places, you still can :D

I love Wisconsin!
Link Posted: 12/4/2002 7:51:34 PM EDT
[#16]
Quoted:
Here's one corner of my gun room.  There's a lot more elsewhere in the room.

[url]http://photos.ar15.com/ImageGallery/IG_LoadImage.asp?iImageUnq=981[/url]
View Quote


Brou,

Where'd you get that storage shelf?

PONY_DRIVER
Link Posted: 12/4/2002 7:54:03 PM EDT
[#17]
Link Posted: 12/4/2002 8:02:51 PM EDT
[#18]
Hey Boom,

Give this guy a call or e-mail (he will respond... I had a few quick chats with him - a bit odd though[:D])

[url]http://www.rocketguy.com/oldhome.html[/url]

Edit: He's the guy that is launching himself to space in May...
Link Posted: 12/4/2002 8:14:54 PM EDT
[#19]
I attempted to make homemade rocket engines this summer, but I didn't have the money, tools, or facilities to do it right.

In January, I might start again on the right foot, but make ammonium nitrate/magnesium engines instead of potassium nitrate/sugar engines.

For anyone interested in building your own engines, this is a great site that sells chemincals and starter kits.  Also electronics and fuselage bodies too [url]http://www.ssaerospace.com/[/url]
Link Posted: 12/4/2002 8:58:05 PM EDT
[#20]
[url]http://www.rocketguy.com[/url] this guy is in the US bt I cant find what state.

[img]http://www.rocketguy.com/rocket/121001_SpaceSuit_02.jpg[/img]

his space suit purchased from the russians

this dudes gonna fly this thing into space!

[img]http://www.rocketguy.com/rocket/tank1.jpg[/img]

Unreal!

[img]http://www.rocketguy.com/images/aerial_overview.jpg[/img]

His 'NASA' compound, centrifuge

[img]http://www.rocketguy.com/rocket/rge.jpg[/img]





Link Posted: 12/4/2002 9:04:40 PM EDT
[#21]
I dabbled in it a couple years ago.  

Our (yes, our) 57mm diameter engine, based loosely on Richard Naaka's design, was an ammonium nitrate and powdered sugar engine.  Safe mixture, and we did not lose much power compared to the dangerous mixtures.  We figured that engine put out 300 lbs of thrust.  On the test stand, it put a plume into the air about 30 feet long.  Hot to the touch for a half hour afterwards.

We never got around to finishing the rocket as my budddy drifted away - wife problems...
Link Posted: 12/4/2002 9:07:19 PM EDT
[#22]
Gaspain,

He is in Bend, Oregon. I'm gonna have to cruise down there when he does his thing. I be sure to tape it...
Link Posted: 1/4/2003 10:09:52 PM EDT
[#23]
Very cool Boomholzer, and you others.

We never got that involved with the finer aspects of rocketry around here.  Our focus was more on the payload (aka warhead) rather than navigation--although we intended to get to that later [:D].  We must have gotten jobs or something about that time, which distracted us away from that, and probably prevented us from losing appendages.

Quoted:
Im a lightning freak. I've been blessed to witness ball-lightning on 2 occasions. Alot of scientists argue it does not exsist. Very cool!
View Quote

Now that is something I want to see!
Link Posted: 1/4/2003 10:30:08 PM EDT
[#24]
Ditto... very cool stuff. The extent of my interests in model rocketry are all fantasys spawned by the classic RPG tube thread a couple years back. I'd love to launch some model rockets from an RPG tube just to fuck with the neighbors.
Link Posted: 1/4/2003 10:54:47 PM EDT
[#25]
Quoted:
Ditto... very cool stuff. The extent of my interests in model rocketry are all fantasys spawned by the classic RPG tube thread a couple years back. I'd love to launch some model rockets from an RPG tube just to fuck with the neighbors.
View Quote


In HS launched a few 24" Estes rockets w/"D" from a 4" PVC pipe. Trick is to lube the tube with dry graphite. I modifed the shortened fins with opposed paperboard "sliders". Actually worked OK.
I dragged it out once to combat some local neighbors in a roman candle/bottle rocket fight over a 4th July party. Fireworks were being launched across properties. They gave up on sight of the home-brew aluminum colored rocket in a OD painted tube. [:D] I shot it out into the back 40 and everyone gasped cause they did'nt know what it actually was.
Link Posted: 1/4/2003 11:26:53 PM EDT
[#26]
Quoted:
Quoted:
Ditto... very cool stuff. The extent of my interests in model rocketry are all fantasys spawned by the classic RPG tube thread a couple years back. I'd love to launch some model rockets from an RPG tube just to fuck with the neighbors.
View Quote


In HS launched a few 24" Estes rockets w/"D" from a 4" PVC pipe. Trick is to lube the tube with dry graphite. I modifed the shortened fins with opposed paperboard "sliders". Actually worked OK.
I dragged it out once to combat some local neighbors in a roman candle/bottle rocket fight over a 4th July party. Fireworks were being launched across properties. They gave up on sight of the home-brew aluminum colored rocket in a OD painted tube. [:D] I shot it out into the back 40 and everyone gasped cause they did'nt know what it actually was.
View Quote


Sounds familiar.  Only when I shot mine off I was standing in the living room in front of my parents.  It managed to burn holes in the couch, love seat, and put large carbon streaks all over the room.  That damn HAIR TRIGGER!. A small fire broke out but luckily my father extinguished it after only a small amount of fire damage.  At that moment, I was the most terrified sixth grader on the face of the earth.  But it felt so good holding my home made rpg in my hands.

It had a momentary switch on a 4' aluminum tube.  The "c" rockets had stiff plastic fins that centered it in the tube.  That was a pretty cool.  It also had a rechargeable battery source that doubled as a handle.  Hey I even made some cross-hair sights!

Ahh those were the days!  I still can't believe they didn't administer some physical punishment.

~rssc
Link Posted: 1/5/2003 1:05:55 PM EDT
[#27]
Quoted:
Hybrid motor? Solid fuel/liquid oxidizer? Would that be something you'd have to make or does someone make such a thing. I'm really into rocketry but am still buying my engines from the hobby store, not making them as I know some people do.
View Quote


The hybrid motors currently in use use nitrous oxide (oxidizer) and rubber/composite (fuel grain).  These motors are REALLY cool, I saw many of them launched this last July at a LDRS (Large Dangerous Rocket Ships) launch just south of Amarillo, Texas.  They make a rumbling sound kinda like a semi truck does when it slams on the airbrakes.  High power rocketry is fun, I flew a 1/4 scale Patriot missile on an H242 motor at the LDRS launch and it was one of the SMALLER rockets flown there!
Link Posted: 1/5/2003 6:54:59 PM EDT
[#28]
can someone in the know tell me the biggest engine a guy can get w/o dealing with the BATF.
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