A Fish Named Wallyum
10-16-2005, 08:24 PM
I tried to talk some of my local, small field friends into flying yesterday, but everyone had prior commitments. When my wife and kids left to go to church, I gathered up a bunch of small field birds that hadn't seen the skies for a while and headed up to B6-4 Field, which is now closer than ever.
When I arrived I set the pad up, checked the camera batteries, opened the engine totes, picked out the rockets and grabbed the launcher. :confused: No, I looked for the launcher. :mad: No, the launcher is still at home. So, I packed up the pad, the camera, the engines and the rockets and headed home to look for a launcher, all the while considering it a bad omen and thinking about calling the whole thing off.
As it turned out, the launcher happened to be in the first place I looked, as was the spare battery. That lifted my spirits a little and I headed back to the field. The same two kids who were playing ball when I was there earlier were still there. I chose the other field and set up again. First off the pad was the Quest Totally Tubular that I've had finished for several years but never seemed to think of when the time came to fly. Since it was somewhat windy I loaded it with a B4-4. No matter. It STREAKED off the pad and appeared to be still traveling up when the ejection charge fired. The streamer brought it down quite rapidly, but right into a grove of trees that line US 27. Somehow I managed to miss them, but find the gravel parking lot. The hard landing bent a tube and ripped three of them loose. Easy fix. This one has small field regular written all over it.
Next up was the Estes Cosmic Cobra on a B6-4. This one also flew well and threaded the needle between the trees on recovery. It missed the gravel parking lot by a foot or so, which was good because the parachute didn't do much more than act as a streamer. The nose cone turned in its usual impressive performance and landed a few yards past the body. The first launch had piqued the curiousity of the two ballplayers, but this one brought them running. Built in recovery crew.
From this point I let the kids choose the rockets. They had a million questions and both turned out to be from our new neighborhood. One was the son of a guy I worked with in high school at a butcher shop. They were enthralled with my newly built Quest E-Z Glider, and I was itching to give it a try, so I loaded a B4-2 in and fired it up. I couldn't have been more impressed with the flight. Straight up off the pad and the glider began flying freely at ejection. Unfortunately the glider caught a rare mid-October thermal and headed off for parts unknown. The booster landed in the middle of US 27 and sat for several minutes in the tire tracks of one lane before I was able to retrieve it. (I'd been busy watching the glider, then hoping to see the glider. No luck.) Got the booster back okay, but no telling where the glider went. According the one of the kids, it started rising and headed off toward the school. Bummer, but I'll be replacing this one. :cool:
Next up was the Astron Alpha IV, which caught the kids eyes because it's shiny. This one flew great also, but probably shouldn't have used a streamer. It hit hard, but it's tough like the Alpha III it came from. No damage.
The Mini-Bomarc was next, on a 1/2A3-2T. Another pack of Woodfill kids arrived just as I launched and this impressed the hell out of them. It only made it to about 100 feet before the ejection charge fired, but the rocket exploded into four pieces as the nose cone and both pods blew off. It sounded like someone was lobbing M-80's at us. I got all the pieces back, and remain further convinced that the Estes ejection charges need some work. Like yesterday if not sooner.
The new group of kids took an immediate interest in the 18mm Condor that I dragged out of mothballs in the Grand Avenue basement a few hours earlier. I'd lost interest in this one after it suffered an Estes Dent back in 2001, but I had added a large piece of elastic to the original cord to keep the dent from happening again. Loaded with a B4-2, the Condor got to a decent height, but landed hard in the gravel. The glider spiraled in, showing a need for some weight in the rear. Both pieces were recovered without damage. The kids really thought this one was cool. They kept asking "Does this one have a glider?" whenever I'd load another rocket with an engine. :D
Since I'd been lucky to this point (Q E-Z Glider the exception,) I decided to fly something that had some legs. I picked my seldom flown Semroc Sky Hook and scrounged another B4-4 from the engine box. Holy Schlitz did that thing CRANK! It was a beautiful flight that drew a chorus of "WOW"'s from my audience, which now numbered seven as a friend and his son came out of the woods to spectate. All six boys took off after the Sky Hook, but it looked to be rising as it floated off into the neighborhood where my grandparents had lived years ago. Keith and I corralled the boys before they could chase it across the busy road, then we watched as it headed off toward the river and points north. Several years earlier I had lost an Estes Mini Shuttle in exactly the same way. Too bad. I really liked that Sky Hook. It was one of my first Semroc kits. ;)
From this point I decided that I'd fly the two draggier rockets that I had left. This way every kid could have a chance to press the button and I probably wouldn't lose anything else. First up was the Centuri Vulcan clone that I built last summer. It flies well, but corkscrews the whole way up. This time was no exception, but the B4-2 didn't allow it to go high enough to get lost. (Although it did just miss the trees.) I'm thinking that it might be time to try this project again, this time with heavier paper. I'm not sure, but I think the paper I used for this version is too lightweight to allow it to hold its shape after takeoff. It's also looking pretty ragged.
Last flight of the day was the Squirrel Works X-RV, also on a B4-2. I lost the original nose cone for this one, so I've been making do with a Yankee cone. There must be extra weight, because the glide that I had on the first flight has been replaced by a dead nose dive. This one nose dived into the gravel, through the trees. No damage, but I need to work on weighting it in the rear.
When I arrived I set the pad up, checked the camera batteries, opened the engine totes, picked out the rockets and grabbed the launcher. :confused: No, I looked for the launcher. :mad: No, the launcher is still at home. So, I packed up the pad, the camera, the engines and the rockets and headed home to look for a launcher, all the while considering it a bad omen and thinking about calling the whole thing off.
As it turned out, the launcher happened to be in the first place I looked, as was the spare battery. That lifted my spirits a little and I headed back to the field. The same two kids who were playing ball when I was there earlier were still there. I chose the other field and set up again. First off the pad was the Quest Totally Tubular that I've had finished for several years but never seemed to think of when the time came to fly. Since it was somewhat windy I loaded it with a B4-4. No matter. It STREAKED off the pad and appeared to be still traveling up when the ejection charge fired. The streamer brought it down quite rapidly, but right into a grove of trees that line US 27. Somehow I managed to miss them, but find the gravel parking lot. The hard landing bent a tube and ripped three of them loose. Easy fix. This one has small field regular written all over it.
Next up was the Estes Cosmic Cobra on a B6-4. This one also flew well and threaded the needle between the trees on recovery. It missed the gravel parking lot by a foot or so, which was good because the parachute didn't do much more than act as a streamer. The nose cone turned in its usual impressive performance and landed a few yards past the body. The first launch had piqued the curiousity of the two ballplayers, but this one brought them running. Built in recovery crew.
From this point I let the kids choose the rockets. They had a million questions and both turned out to be from our new neighborhood. One was the son of a guy I worked with in high school at a butcher shop. They were enthralled with my newly built Quest E-Z Glider, and I was itching to give it a try, so I loaded a B4-2 in and fired it up. I couldn't have been more impressed with the flight. Straight up off the pad and the glider began flying freely at ejection. Unfortunately the glider caught a rare mid-October thermal and headed off for parts unknown. The booster landed in the middle of US 27 and sat for several minutes in the tire tracks of one lane before I was able to retrieve it. (I'd been busy watching the glider, then hoping to see the glider. No luck.) Got the booster back okay, but no telling where the glider went. According the one of the kids, it started rising and headed off toward the school. Bummer, but I'll be replacing this one. :cool:
Next up was the Astron Alpha IV, which caught the kids eyes because it's shiny. This one flew great also, but probably shouldn't have used a streamer. It hit hard, but it's tough like the Alpha III it came from. No damage.
The Mini-Bomarc was next, on a 1/2A3-2T. Another pack of Woodfill kids arrived just as I launched and this impressed the hell out of them. It only made it to about 100 feet before the ejection charge fired, but the rocket exploded into four pieces as the nose cone and both pods blew off. It sounded like someone was lobbing M-80's at us. I got all the pieces back, and remain further convinced that the Estes ejection charges need some work. Like yesterday if not sooner.
The new group of kids took an immediate interest in the 18mm Condor that I dragged out of mothballs in the Grand Avenue basement a few hours earlier. I'd lost interest in this one after it suffered an Estes Dent back in 2001, but I had added a large piece of elastic to the original cord to keep the dent from happening again. Loaded with a B4-2, the Condor got to a decent height, but landed hard in the gravel. The glider spiraled in, showing a need for some weight in the rear. Both pieces were recovered without damage. The kids really thought this one was cool. They kept asking "Does this one have a glider?" whenever I'd load another rocket with an engine. :D
Since I'd been lucky to this point (Q E-Z Glider the exception,) I decided to fly something that had some legs. I picked my seldom flown Semroc Sky Hook and scrounged another B4-4 from the engine box. Holy Schlitz did that thing CRANK! It was a beautiful flight that drew a chorus of "WOW"'s from my audience, which now numbered seven as a friend and his son came out of the woods to spectate. All six boys took off after the Sky Hook, but it looked to be rising as it floated off into the neighborhood where my grandparents had lived years ago. Keith and I corralled the boys before they could chase it across the busy road, then we watched as it headed off toward the river and points north. Several years earlier I had lost an Estes Mini Shuttle in exactly the same way. Too bad. I really liked that Sky Hook. It was one of my first Semroc kits. ;)
From this point I decided that I'd fly the two draggier rockets that I had left. This way every kid could have a chance to press the button and I probably wouldn't lose anything else. First up was the Centuri Vulcan clone that I built last summer. It flies well, but corkscrews the whole way up. This time was no exception, but the B4-2 didn't allow it to go high enough to get lost. (Although it did just miss the trees.) I'm thinking that it might be time to try this project again, this time with heavier paper. I'm not sure, but I think the paper I used for this version is too lightweight to allow it to hold its shape after takeoff. It's also looking pretty ragged.
Last flight of the day was the Squirrel Works X-RV, also on a B4-2. I lost the original nose cone for this one, so I've been making do with a Yankee cone. There must be extra weight, because the glide that I had on the first flight has been replaced by a dead nose dive. This one nose dived into the gravel, through the trees. No damage, but I need to work on weighting it in the rear.