If I'm free on that day, and I can do anything to help, I'm game.

Looks like my SSS shot may be pushed back to oktoberfest, as the fireban continues...

Thanks for the offer, the work is the flip side of the coin--commmercial propellant costs something like 70/#=1000N/s vs 10 or 15/# for same DIY. So A commercal J reload may cost 75 bucks, a home brewed alernative 15 bucks. Course if it blows up or fizzles on the pad, no one to blame, but for me, building the entire rocket including motor, gets me jazzed way beyond a kit and commersh reload.
J

My plans are up in the air for OF. If i get the L3 ticket this w/e, some serious propellant brewing in my immediate future for an N-M shot to 30k+ at Balls. (I turned 50 this year and while I couldn't shoot my age in kilofeet, want to make sure at 60 I can). That means I need only to go up 7.5 percent a year like a good investment to double in 10. Not that my plans are exactly the same.
40K in 2007, 60 in 2008. 100K by 2010.

Assuming I get the rocket back at the Playa. i'll load it with as much commercial propellant as I can afford--probably M-L, but would like to burn more than 20KN-s.
John S

PS: If you can help pack propellant for the Balls shot let me know, APCP is an epoxy so have a pot life to contend with when packing the grains, any helpers will get rewarded for there efforts. Guessing it will take 4 sessions.

Hmm doing staging of that level is pretty stout work. I would consider myself a pretty accomplished flyer at high speeds(mach 2+ under the belt) and would maybe think a long time about trying something this complex. Let alone just getting Big motors and small rockets to work the way they should. Trying to go anywhere near 20K is a amazing feat (I myself have been an altitude junkie as well greatly competeing with JW and the likes) Where do you plan on trying to work the bugs out. Also who is building the propellant/motor and what formula are you using? Just curious as well as interested.

Careful, Conway, asking someone their formula is like asking a rock hound where he or she finds their rocks. 😯 Proprietary info. Most people won't give them out for safety reasons as well. Generically, they have a metal powder (NOT magnesium), an iron oxide catalyst, a certain type of rubber-based binder, an epoxy curing agent, and, of course, ammonium perchlorate. The best way to learn and learn HOW to use formulas is to visit and help out at a APCP mixing party. They're mentioned occasionally on this site.

Actually I have been into EX/research for sometime.(this is actually my second round with NCR as a member as well as CERG. I took a break from rocketry for about 3 years so im one of the past members) Infact when NCR was first founded i was on the Exec commitie and my First roll was(with NCR anyhow cause I was exec with PHITS as well) as the First EX/Research Chairman. Ive played with and mixed some plenty. Been involved with An and AP formulations. Its all pretty simple as I understand and know what they are fortunatly. Not really any real trade secrets anymore with all that stuff to much amongst fellow research peeps. Really the whole reson why the naming has changed from experimental to Research anyhow cause we arent truely EX cause we for the most part used pre formulated fuels Like Wimpy red or Polish Roho or Super Polish Roho just to name a few. I was curious as to what the name for the formula was and the actual deveolper. Like the polish stuff was done By Pat G. Anyhow was just curious as to how tried and tested the particular formula was. But just a Lil backround on me and my curiosity on his formula. John if you dont wish to publicly tell me shoot me a PM.

I didn't know, Conway. You're definitely qualified. Sorry about my misunderstanding, relatively new guy with the club. What was this thread about again? 🙂

On the far Right (facing it) when veiwing post it only shows the name and date of the poster. How about show the thread title in that forum. I belive it would help people find subjects of interest instead of guessing what that persons post was. Just maybe something to spark peoples interes into the topics in those threads as well as those just looking will get a chance to see them as it will catch their eye.

Conway, your suggestion is excellent. It's so easy to forget the thread title.

All is good Bruce. I look forward to meeting many of the newere members that I havent met since my 3 year off time from rocketry. Now Im back and for good. Infact I have to say the bug bite is worse then the first time as a BAR. Hope I didnt sound conceded with my post. just read it and man... Anyhow I think that when Warren gets back he and I will sit down and see what we can do to make some content improvements like the titling. back to more then with Octoberfets projects and plans.................

conway,
i hear you, with each recrudescence of the illness--now theres a 2 bit word-- gets worse. Episode 1, at 11 to 14, pretty bad, and you know what, I still remember my very first flight. Alpha what else? Didn't even know x-actos existed, cut the balsa with scissors , excess glue still dripping off the end, crumpled the chute like one would a wad of paper, shoved it in, and believe it or not, lit the first time, soared to what 150' on a 1/2 A, chte blossomed open, and I was in the "grippe".

episode 2 almost 15 years later during grad/med school, wanted to volunteer where my wife of the time was working. Bunch of bored pre-pubescent males messing with fireworks, Tandy computer (if thats not an oxymoron) and caught up in shuttle fever. No brainer, launched a rocketry program, then teamed up with a couple other guys and WARP, the predecessor of UROC was born. Heady times, as HPR was getting a foothold, but I couldn't afford it, and flew nothing bigger than F's, those rarely.

episode 3 (present): now willing to quit medicine, go back to grad school and get a masters in aerospace engineering. 35 to 40 K takes no special talents, 100k does. Taking the GRE tuesday, need a 740 on the math. Wish me luck,
J

PS: Bruce, yes, these are simple formulae for apcp, tried and trued--no one lists them openly on the net out of respect for potential misuse, and more likely accidents by the umlearned. Bout as hard as making a cake.
More flammable, and very time consuming.

Ahh yes rember my first time .. was a Big bertha. then later came some of my higher power flights on my first G motors wich were Vulacn and Areojet I belive it was. Then time away and back to it with a 4inch diameter Endeavour for L1 and L2 now back again and doing L3.

Now I would have to highly dissagree that doing anything over 20 K is actually pretty tuff. Now mind you I am talking from completly launch to a full recovery. I know that John Wilke and some others I have know very well have pushed the envolope hard and its tougher then you think. I to have been through my altitude love affair and still love it much But if you have never even been close then its really hard to describe. Now I also have freinds that have flown to 100K+ and thats unbeliveable tough. I would not discount anything about going as high as 30 to 40K though.

So john does this propellant have a name that its ben used as before or now. No formula just so I know the name as I will probably know the formula if its a trued and tested propellant thats been around.

Ah, a Centuri Javelin in the summer of 1965... I can still smell the sulphur in the BG residue. I love that smell. 🙂 And I still get the same feeling, absolute awe. Never stopped, though went a year or two without flying at least something. Family to raise. 🙂 But I always had something in the works. Been wanting to get into HPR since the mid-80's, from reading all those TRA magazines. The highest in power I ever got in the late 80's was a FB kit from US Rockets that had three FSI F's in the booster and three in the upper stage. Sweet... 8) Then came NCR, FINALLY!!!!!!!!!!

Guys, checked and amateur rocketry has reached space--well, sub-orbital space at just over 50+ miles. And, 100k has been achieved by a handful of people. John, Conway, wouldn't that be a great club project, getting to 100k? The knowledge and skill in this club could do it. Heck, Wilkes is almost a quarter of the way there already!

Okay, okay, a bit ambitious; we have other things to deal with... but this would be a good thread topic... what would it take to get a rocket to 100k?

the right rocket and an R motor.

Alternatively, the right staged contraption and a pair of P's could probably do it...

All carbon fiber, minimum diameter... how many hundred pounds of propellant? Now we're talkin'! 😀

Two stage max.