Adrian

I hope so, but I’m an engineer, so I don’t know either. Is there an English major in the house?

Thanks, Warren.Ever since I started asking TRA about it in 2007, they haven’t acknowledged the existence of an approved altimeters list. After I sent Tom Rouse a bunch of data and he specifically said the Parrot was good to go,…   Read more»

The only altimeters that are TRA approved for altitude records and contests are the 20 specific serial number Raven2s that are in Tom Rouse’s possession. So our contests need to be separate from that process.It’s up to the contest director…   Read more»

I wonder if there is a way to do this with 2 chambers: One containing the liquid, from which the water exits as a superheated liquid, and then a plenum where the water vaporizes due to a pressure drop before…   Read more»

Hey everyone,I have quite the engineering question that I need some ideas on. In my Engineering Projects class, we have started our final year project. I convinced my group to try to make a steam powered rocket motor. Here is…   Read more»

Here’s the video on making a nose cone mold.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CRlWkMmMKl8I'll have to look in to the method you’re referring to Adrian. Do you have any links?TonyHere it is. This is from a professional sailplane manufacturer who is making a 130″ wingspan,…   Read more»

I’m looking forward to the nose cone mold video.I have a 29mm mandrel that I have made one set of molds from that I’m not all that happy with, and I’m thinking about making new molds. I saw on an…   Read more»

Firing up rocksim now to see what it might take. This would be my first multistage (not counting Estes motors).I’m glad to hear you’re entering. Getting people like you to step up to a staged project is just what I…   Read more»

Great idea for a contest, but since I utterly refuse to go to any launch with that many people, its not likely I would go to any LDRS in order to fly it. I’ve got the project for it, but…   Read more»

8) Adrian, What about a dart? Tim

Bob isn’t comfortable with them, so darts are a no-go.

Thanks, John.According to some posts on the TRA email list, the 50kft waiver for LDRS this year only happened after months of difficult negotiations. I think I remember hearing they had one to 45k before. Last year at aiarfest it…   Read more»

There are several RC airplane products that have GPS-based “return to home” functions that work with the aircraft servos. Getting the mechanical part right is the hard part for rockets. I’m starting to lean toward a deployed wing + low…   Read more»

An all-mechanical solution would be cool in a retro way.My own project that may come up to the front burner sometime this season is a GPS-based, self-returning rocket. I have a cheap RC paraglider canopy on order that should be…   Read more»

I have been working with this little beastie with the intention of hooking it to generic data logger, which will make it into a rocket eventually. http://www.sparkfun.com/products/9156Sadly it has not gotten much attention, got in over my head with clockwork…   Read more»

A couple of tips:Paper towels make pretty good breather material.Sealing vacuum bags with bag sealer tape is sometimes necessary, but almost always a pain. Whenever I can make it fit, I just use a lawn&leaf bag and put a knot…   Read more»

My mistake; I thought the question was about the Beeline GPS. Agreed about the version with the 900 MHz module.

The main reason to get the beeline GPS is that it’s smaller, easily fitting into a 38mm coupler. You would also need a HAM license to operate it. The Telemetrum combines the GPS tracker with a basic recording altimeter, and…   Read more»

Maybe a better alternative is to roll your own. Dry carbon fiber is really pretty cheap, and there’s lots of information out there on how to do it. 38mm mandrels are available from McMasater-Carr, though I haven’t looked into the…   Read more»

After I rebuilt my computers and lost RS 8 in the process, and after pointing out bugs that didn’t get fixed in RS 9, I gave up and I only use Open Rocket and RASAero now.

So the graph that it plots for you isn’t accurate? I use this feature all the tim but I haven’t built anything yet that I’ve flown enough to really test it’s accuracy.There have been many times where I set the…   Read more»