First School Launch Today!

[Jtrops]

We had our first launch today, and it was a blast (I'm sure that's not a new pun around these parts). We had 20 rockets, and most of them flew pretty well if not very high. We had one surprise in a rocket that for all practical purposes shouldn't have flown, but held the height record for 5 launches until it was usurped. We ended up having 5 rockets that flew over 150', and one that reached almost 300' .

The launcher worked very well. Not perfectly, but very well. We had a few "early" releases. After class was done I looked more closely at the gardena, and I think the locking mechanism was being held back a bit by too much hose clamp pressure around the collar. I backed off on the clamp, and tried a few launches with no early releases. I think it's good now. I may try to come up with an alternate way to attach the control wires to the collar without clamping around the girth.

Now that the students have had some experience with the whole process we are going to take some time on Monday to refine the rockets and then launch again. I suspect that most of the low fliers could have improved with some nose weight.

Anyway it's been a lot of fun for everyone, and a great way to finish up the school year.

A few students took pictures, and at least one shot video. I'll see if I can get some of the media and post it.

Thanks for all of the help, and this great resource.

Jerry

[bugwubber]

That's awesome!

[U.S. Water Rockets1]

We had our first launch today, and it was a blast (I'm sure that's not a new pun around these parts). We had 20 rockets, and most of them flew pretty well if not very high. We had one surprise in a rocket that for all practical purposes shouldn't have flown, but held the height record for 5 launches until it was usurped. We ended up having 5 rockets that flew over 150', and one that reached almost 300' .

The launcher worked very well. Not perfectly, but very well. We had a few "early" releases. After class was done I looked more closely at the gardena, and I think the locking mechanism was being held back a bit by too much hose clamp pressure around the collar. I backed off on the clamp, and tried a few launches with no early releases. I think it's good now. I may try to come up with an alternate way to attach the control wires to the collar without clamping around the girth.

Now that the students have had some experience with the whole process we are going to take some time on Monday to refine the rockets and then launch again. I suspect that most of the low fliers could have improved with some nose weight.

Anyway it's been a lot of fun for everyone, and a great way to finish up the school year.

A few students took pictures, and at least one shot video. I'll see if I can get some of the media and post it.

Thanks for all of the help, and this great resource.

Jerry

That sounds really interesting. Can you tell us more about the rocket that you say should not have flown at all but ended up holding the altitude record for a while. What was it about the rocket that was so unusual? It sounds like it would be a great topic to discuss.

[Jtrops]

That sounds really interesting. Can you tell us more about the rocket that you say should not have flown at all but ended up holding the altitude record for a while. What was it about the rocket that was so unusual? It sounds like it would be a great topic to discuss.

I'll see if I can take a picture of the rocket tomorrow. It was designed to win the "most creative" award. With that in mind the student didn't even consider launching it. It had fins all over it, and many of them were crooked, or at odd angles. I wonder if it would have done better as just a bottle, or if somehow the fins helped it. I don't know. It was certainly a surprise to see it go so well.

[Water Rocket Expert]

How high did it go?

[U.S. Water Rockets1]

That sounds really interesting. Can you tell us more about the rocket that you say should not have flown at all but ended up holding the altitude record for a while. What was it about the rocket that was so unusual? It sounds like it would be a great topic to discuss.

I'll see if I can take a picture of the rocket tomorrow. It was designed to win the "most creative" award. With that in mind the student didn't even consider launching it. It had fins all over it, and many of them were crooked, or at odd angles. I wonder if it would have done better as just a bottle, or if somehow the fins helped it. I don't know. It was certainly a surprise to see it go so well.

Please post the photo if you can of the rocket. It sounds cool!

[Jtrops]

I'm sorry to be so late in replying. This last week of school was quite a bit more hectic than normal, and as a result a lot of thins I wanted to do (like get more pictures/video) didn't happen. I'll send an email to the student who made the rocket to see if he can send me some snaps with his phone.

Now that Summer is starting my plan is to build a rocket with a bigger pressure chamber, and a parachute. As much as I have read about deployment systems I am still intrigued by the simplicity of a sillyputty timer, or the balloon release when the cylinder loses pressure and its expansion.

I have to admit that last one has me thinking. It doesn't start to release until after the pressure is spent, and then it times the release based on the size of the inlet holes. I have tried to find more documentation of it, but at the moment I have only found one site with reference to it. We'll see how it goes.