Water Rocket Forum

We managed to get in some powered test runs on the weekend at our new test track. This one is actually a bus parking area for overflow buses at Sydney Olympic Park.

We did about 7 runs and overall we were happy with the results, we had probably 3 runs in the 85-95m range and did increase our personal distance record to 102.5m (uphill too), although we are not ready to claim any wra records just yet. It was great to bring the car home in one piece, no rolls, no crashes ... whew ..

We still had some thrust steering issues and at the new location we didnt have any weights to hold the launcher down which we think also made the launches not as straight as they could have been.

There is more work to do but we are heading in the right direction. R/C steering seems to be the way to go

Here is the video .. best watched in HD ....

[ytubehd][/ytubehd]

We will have a launch day writeup on our website during the week with more details.

http://wrocket.hampson.net.au

-todd-

This was your best video yet, Todd. I love that every time you go back you have more improvements and they all seem to work. The steering is looking like the biggest difference since you began. With the ability to keep the car on course, you should be able to continue to make farther and faster runs! Thanks for posting the vid!

For a portable weight you could try weights for body-building.

For the stability of your car I would consider to put 2 more wheels.

The 2 wheels would be behind the car (so the car would have a "Y" shape"), the distance between one wheel and the main body should be half the length of the car.

In real cars the stability of car comes from the distance between each wheel, altough your car is long it´s not wide.

You could also try a structure like the Catamaran boats.

great video!!! great results!!!! well done Todd and your little crew! Try turning back to the launcher when the thrust goes out, it ll make a great video, if the car doesnt tumble for better steering i would go as razias said and make the wheels wider apart, but overall well done again! 100 meters is amasing for a WRC!

Tim,
Thanks for the comments ... much appreciated ... we are pretty keen to chase the 400ft mark now with this car ....

Razias,
Thanks for the idea ... I dont have any weights lying around unfortunately ... i looked at the price of them on Ebay and they are expensive ... I think I will make up a couple of concrete blocks with U shaped metal handles in the tops. A 20kg bag of concrete is about $6 so I can make up two blocks ... should be easy to transport in the back of the car ... I can probably even just leave them in the bushes beside the track ... who would want to steal them

I have seen a rocket car with similar rear wheel design behind the car, but not as far back as you suggest. Do you have any data on the length behind the car the wheels should be ?

Jelo,
Thanks .. I will see if its possible to do .. the car can turn 180 degrees no problem, but whether its got enough thrust remaining to get back to the camera ... I dont know

-todd-

i just love doing something crazy when my work starts to work (accidental play on words)