Mini-Palooza at B6-4 Field

 This launch happened several weeks back, but life kept me from sitting down to do this post in the weeks since.  I had an idea for Mini-Palooza while trying to organize my basement back in June.  I was pulling rockets that hadn't flown in several years out of my totes when it struck me that many of them were mini-powered.  I don't need to be struck repeatedly.  Well, usually.  This was the sequence of events that led to me declaring a Mini-Palooza event at B6-4 Field.

Launching hadn't happened for a while, and in that while a lot of my gear had been scattered.  I'd shown up at the field a week or so before the Palooza and found that my pad was missing the piece that goes between the rod and the tripod.  I later found it while cleaning out my car, but when I arrived at the field on this day, I found that I was missing the blast deflector.  I made a judgement call to not scrub the launch since I was flying all mini birds and using a standoff.  Judgement has never been one of my strong suits.

After much consideration, first off the pad would be the Estes Lucky Seven.  Ah, who am I kidding.  I just grabbed the closest one to me.  This hadn't been flown since earlier this year, which kind of blows my "seldom flown" idea out of the water.  Nonetheless, it would fly on an A10-3T after two previous flights on 1/2As.  

I was expecting decent altitude from this flight, but overall I was somewhat disappointed.  The flight was fairly straight off the pad to about 300'.  Ejection occurred fairly early, and the parachute failed to deploy.  The rocket came back to the ground rather quickly and hit hard in the grass next to the pad.  Had this been an infield landing it likely would have cost a fin or two.

Flight #2 was the Estes Sprite, a rocket I cloned back in 2013, which was when it last flew.  I'd made it mini-powered since I'd heard tale of other Sprites flying out of sight on regular 18mm motors.  I thought mini power would make for easy-to-find recoveries at B6-4 Field.  

The A3-4T flight was quick and I felt lucky to get the launch pic, especially considering what I saw when I looked up to catch the rest of the flight.  Nothing.  It seemed like it was just overhead at one point, and the ejection charge clearly sounded like it happened just above me, but despite scanning the skies I never saw orange, either the rocket or the streamer.  I walked the whole field looking for a flash of orange.  There were an amazing number of Reese's Peanut Butter cup wrappers, but no sign of the Sprite.  (Apparently not everyone is concerned about taking their trash with them.)  I reluctantly gave up the search after ten minutes.  

Third off the pad would be the Semroc Triton.  I wasn't all that interested in the Triton when I first saw it, I bought it because at the time I bought everything Carl put out just to keep him putting stuff out.  Not sure if I bought two like I normally did, but I'd say it's likely.  Secondly, it was one of the original Semroc birds back in the late 60's.  This was the third paint scheme I'd tried, all of which featured some neon orange to aid in recovery.  Since I'd already experienced "fire & forget" rockets, I decided to make the Triton mini-powered to cut down on altitude.

The previous flight of the Triton had ended with a nose-dive into the asphalt parking lot of the school, which was what occasioned the repaint.  The pad was set up almost dead center on the field, behind second base.  The flight was fairly high and straight.  The Triton was still heading up at ejection and was pushed even higher by the ejection charge.  It tipped over and returned to the infield heading straight down.  I was expecting the worst, having had a Custom Sunracer completely disassemble itself on a nose down infield landing, but that one had been shot at the infield while facing down.  The Triton just hit hard and bounced.  Since the nose cone was spongy from the 2015 contact with the parking lot, there wasn't much chance of additional damage as long as the fins stayed on.  I have no flight pics because I evidently hit some kind of button on my phone that caused the whole flight to be condensed to 1.5 seconds.

Looking back, I'm guessing that I bought so many of the Estes X-Prize kits because there wasn't all that much interesting coming out of the Big E back then.  I think the only one's I'm missing are the Space Ship One and Cosmos Mariner.  That said, the Gauchito is my favorite of the bunch, (with the Starchaser a close second.)  I liked the looks of the kit, and figured I could use it as the basis for a Little Joe at some point.  Eventually I just built it as intended during a build frenzy, and once I flew it, I was impressed.

This was a stovepipe A10-3T flight, straight up to 311' then straight down to the infield just fifteen feet from the launch pad.  The parachute did deploy and unfurl, but still hit hard.  Surprisingly, there was no damage.

Damage?  You want damage?  Well the Estes Micron would be the flight for you.  The Micron was one of my earlier eBay buys, and a favorite built rocket purchase.  It had great paint and patina and only needed a new shock cord to be ready for flight.  

Loaded with an 1/2A3-4T, the Micron left the pad with a gentle arc heading toward third base.  The flight looked perfect from the ground, and I didn't notice anything until it landed.  When I got to the landing site I found the micron missing a fin and with the body tube area under the fin delaminated.  I looked all around the landing area, but found no sign of the fin, leading me to believe the contact occurred at ejection rather than landing, and I somehow missed the fin falling to the field.

Several years ago I took to the internet to find rockets to clone in "close enough" fashion.  One of the catalogs I turned up was the 1969 MRI product sheet on Ninfinger.   Ninfinger Productions: 1969 Model Rocket Industries Catalog  MRI was a predecessor to MPC and AVI, and I got interested in close-enoughing an MRI Zeus.  I hammered mine together as best as I could, but Scott Hansen has since posted the particulars in a thread at YORF.  Ye Olde Rocket Forum - MRI Zeus #3-7202 (rocketshoppe.com)

Surprisingly tiny, I decided to go mini-power with this one.  Even with the smaller engine mount there is very little room for recovery equipment.  It had flown previously, and well, on an A3-4T in the cornfield, so I expected similar results on this 1/2A3-4T flight.  Not.  Even.  Close.  BUD!  The Zeus started skywriting as soon as it cleared the rod.  I flailed around with the camera hoping to catch some of the message, but only managed to catch it coasting toward left-center field sideways.  It landed and the ejection charge fired almost simultaneously.  I waited a moment to see if anything appeared to be on fire, but the grass was damp and green from recent rains, so I lucked out there.  The Zeus was undamaged, and a look at the flight pics shows the nose cone flailing around outside of the body tube.  That may be what caused the instability, or it could be that it just pulled loose while the rocket was lurching around the sky.  I'll give it another shot just to be sure.

The Zeus stuck the landing.  Sort of.

Flight #7 was the Estes Mini Fat Boy, the rocket that should have led the return of a whole new batch of Goonies from Estes.  I wasn't wildly excited about this when it hit the pegs, but I've come to consider it as a perfect beginner's bird, much like the Baby Bertha.  Easy to build, easy to finish, it's a great choice for flying on small fields.  Of course, it's out of production.

This should have been a perfect flight for the field.  It was an A10-3T flight, which usually provides a flight high enough to be entertaining, without coming close to overflying the field.  This one had the altitude down pat, but the same bugaboo that had plagued other parachute flights on the day caught up with this one.  Parawad.  All because I didn't feel like making a trip back home.  As I said, altitude was excellent, somewhere around 300'.  Ejection occurred around apogee, and the whole wounded duck mess came crashing down in left field.

I had a Wolverine in my 1970's fleet, but I can't remember ever flying it.  Because of that, it was high on my list of projects when I discovered cloning.  Can you have a mini launch without having a Wolverine on the pad at some point?  At the same time, has anyone ever had a stable flight with a Wolverine?  

Well, I still haven't seen a stable Wolverine flight.  I think the issue with my 2001-02 build is that I didn't angle the wing fins enough.  I really need to try again, but the motivation isn't there.  This flight would be an A10-3T.  No chance of trouble because the Wolverine shakes around so much during the flight that it's scrubbing altitude from the moment it leaves the pad.  Today it made it around 200', which is pretty much what I expect on every flight.  Though wiggly, the flight was largely straight and wound up ejecting just after forward motion stopped over shortstop.  True to form, the parachute couldn't be bothered and it landed hard in the grass in short left field.

The Loadlifter 1-A would be the next to last flight on the day.  This was an Estes D.O.M. plan from February, 1964.  I was 18 months old.  Still, it spoke to me when I was making one of my frequent trips through the archives looking for ideas.  

The flight of the Loadlifter was an oddity on the afternoon.  Unlike every other flight that headed out from the pad at liftoff, the Loadlifter arced behind me and to the right.  Altitude was excellent, with the 1/2A3-4T taking it up around the 250' mark.  Ejection occurred as it was tipping over and it began a fast fall to the centerfield grass.  Again, recovery wasn't what was hoped for as the chute almost-sorta-kinda deployed at the 40' mark, slowing things down, but not actually acting like a parachute.  Yep, parawad again.  Man, I miss my chute powder.

The last flight hurt.  When I first started flying in 1977, the other kids in the neighborhood all bought their rockets at the short lived JC Penney Toyland in the fabulous Newport Shopping Center.  My brother and I chose Betas, but there were several Mosquitos, a Rogue and a Javelin/Super Flea combo.  It took me a while, but I eventually recreated our neighborhood fleet, and the Javelin/Super Flea was the last I finished.  I had the Javelin along with me, but the Super Flea got the call as the final bird off the pad for Mini-Palooza I.

The flight would be on a 1/4A-3T, so no worries, right?  Kind of a harmless popup on the infield with the bases juiced kind of flight.  No runners advance.  No runs score.  Then the catcher loses it in the sun and thus starts the cha-cha.  The Flea left the pad angling out over the infield, which was the first bad omen.  Then at ejection, instead of separating the two halves of the rocket, the motor fired itself into oblivion and the Flea became ballistic.  Even without seeing it in front of me, I knew it was bad by the sound.  Thwacks like that mean broken rocket parts, which was exactly the case.  The Flea completely tossed one fin and loosened two others.  

By this time I was tired of fighting the flies and had damaged two of my favorite minis and lost another.  I packed up and left the field, dispirited about my batting average on the day.  But first, a photo op of the survivors.

Yeah, that space is where the Sprite should be.  As I was pulling down the street by the school, I impulsively turned into the driveway, hoping against hope that I'd find my missing bird.  I saw it as soon as I entered the driveway, sitting where anyone else would have run it over if it would have been a school day with normal traffic.  I called my day a success.