June 2002 launch report (6/29/2002)
The range is an alley now? I'm confused.
On Saturday, June 29 a large group of people came out to the
sod farm in Blaine. This was a "make up" launch
because the regular launch (1 week earlier) had a weather
cancellation (3 inches of rain on that Friday). It was very
warm, sunny, and breezy. Launching started at 9 am and went
until early afternoon. All told, 106 flights took to the
skies.
This was the first large MASA launch to use a "misfire
alley" style range. People brought and used their own
launch pads and controllers or shared with someone else. The
LCO used a wireless microphone connected to the PA system to direct
the launches. Several people commented that they liked this
style of launch because it allowed them to fly more rockets with
less waiting. It will probably be tried again sometime in the
future.
A big thanks to:
- Ted Cochran and Alan Estenson for hauling out the gear
- Alan Estenson and Rick Vatsaas for serving LCO duty
A few of the flights:
Several cluster flights took to the skies. Ted Cochran flew
his cloned ranger on three C6-5's. This flight successfully
fulfilled one of Ted's NARTREK Silver requirements. Stuart
Lenz flew "United We Stand" on three A8-3's for a nice,
low-altitude cluster flight. Ellison Lenz flew "Green
Thing's Revenge" three times - twice on clusters of three
A8-3's, and once on a cluster of three B6-4's. He may have
only lit 2 engines on the B flight as it went just a bit
horizontal. Dave Fergus flew his Tri-Stomp successfully on a
cluster of three B6-4's.
Collin Dudra flew his Spitfire 5 times on B and C motors!
Ken Corey-Edstrom flew a plastic model conversion of the Polar
Lights Jupiter II saucer kit. It belly-flopped on the first
flight attempt on a C6-0 (accompanied by the Lost in Space theme
music over the PA) but flew better on a D21 for the 2nd try.
Mike Erpelding flew his extremely oddroc "Ballistic
Bovine" on an F20. Mike also flew a classic Estes Saturn
1B on a D12 to perform his NARTREK Bronze D flight requirement with
style.
Dave Fergus had a great flight of the rear-ejecting IPFI
Strikeship on a F52. Ellison Lenz flew a dragonfly payload in
an Estes Echostar on a B4-2. The dragonfly might have even
survived had Ellison remembered to put a parachute in the
rocket... Ellison managed to put an E9 motor in a stomp
rocket. The resulting (screwy, cruise-missile-ish) flight was
very impressive. Ellison had good flights of his new LOC
Weasel on an E15 and LOC Norad on a F50. Stuart Lenz flew a
variety of oddrocs including a Colgate tube, Pepsi bottle and
Toblerone box (one of which was actually stable)
Paul Newswanger had a nice flight of his Estes ARV Condor with
twin gliders. Glen Overby flew a variety of rockets with odd,
alphanumeric names. Ian Sinclair flew both a Baby Bertha and a
Big Bertha on B motors. David Whitaker was determined to get
30 seconds on B streamer duration, but it just refused to
happen. However, he did have a nice first fight of his
"The Launch Pad" Hellfire rocket on a D12.
More to come...
The Details:
Full launch tally (in
Adobe Acrobat PDF form, requires version 4 or newer of the Acrobat
reader)
The totals were: 106 flights, 120 motors. The
cumulative total impulse was 1326 Ns with an average total impulse
of 11.1 Ns. The motor breakdown follows:
|
Type |
# Burned |
| MicroMaxx |
0 |
|
1/4A |
1 |
|
1/2A |
2 |
|
A |
25 |
|
B |
43 |
|
C |
23 |
|
D |
13 |
|
E |
8 |
|
F |
5 |
|
G |
0 |
|
H |
0 |
(Alan Estenson)
|
