Launch report - 18 April, 1998

WOOSH was finally able to hold a club launch today! The weather was great, apart from occasional breezes, so we got together at the Milwaukee Caounty Grounds.

Initially, the turnout was a bit low, but it improved thru the course of the launch. Kurt Schachtner, Dave Lyle, his son Aaron and one of Aaron's friends, Dave's wife and I arrived at the field a bit after one and, after assessing the wind direction, set up our various launch pads toward the southwest corner of the field. I didn't keep track of everyone's launches, by any means, but here's what I put up and some other impressions.

The first launch of the day was my Estes Nike Arrow, a birthday present from my son, Ansel. This was the first time I had had a chance to put it up. I had trimmed the engine hook, to be sure it didn't extend into the exhaust stream, and it had a very nice flight on an A3-4T. It landed about 20 feet from the launch pad.

I launched my modified Turbo-Copter twice on A8-3s. It flies very well - gets GOOD altitude - and I'll use this for a backup model for the B Helicopter Duration event coming up at AL14.

My Space Plane clone was launched on a 1/2A6-2. The launch was very nice - straight up with a good counter-clockwise spin. With the stronger elastic, the elevons worked well. The glide is a bit steep (since I goofed and put the engine block about a 1/2" too far back and had to add a fair amount of nose weight for launch stability), but it did fly well. I'm in the process of building another with the intent of using an ejecting power pod with mini-engines. With that version I should be able to get a better glide, since the nose weight will be mostly built into the power pod.

I rebuilt my fly-away mini-Saucer, using 1/16" ArtCor. During the course of the launch, I worked on its glide trim. After a number of hand-tosses (*almost* got 'ya, Mark <G>), it flew on an A3-4T. The boost was great - straight up and transition to glide went well. It had a number of light stalls on the way down, but the balance is close. I'll either use this model or my Deltie for the A BG event at AL14. At the moment, I lean toward the saucer since it's got a better boost

I tried out a Marauder that I built from instructions that Astron Mike sent me. Unfortunately, I misunderstood the letter and used 1/16" ArtCor instead of 1/8" material. *** I GOOFED! ***

Again, let me make it clear that this particular error was ENTIRELY my own fault. I have heard good things about Mike's Marauders and I will be rebuilding the model using the proper material, soon.

My Estes Nighthawk went up on an A8-3. It arcs over more than I care for on boost. The glide was pretty good, although still a bit tighter circle than I'd like to see. It's going to take a dedicated launch to finally get it trimmed.

My repaired Quest HL-20 flew on a B6-2. The launch lug must have hung up on the rod, because the rod got whipped over (away from the spectators) and the model left the rod at an angle of at least 45 degrees off the vertical. That said, it made its normal corkscrew flight during the engine burn and had a pretty good glide (almost as good as its first launch at ECOF-97) after motor ejection. I'll check out the rod to see if I can determine where it hung up (probably the joint between the two pieces).

Kurt Schachtner brought several of his sport-scale models, including the Estes Mercury-Atlas (launched twice), a Titan-3E and his just completed Saturn 5. All flew very nicely. The only damage I'm aware of was a cracked fin on the Mercury-Atlas. He wanted to launch his 2-engine cluster Gemini-Titan, but we didn't have a working 12 volt controller available (for reliable ignition), so he decided to wait for another time to launch it. He also flew a couple sport models (an X-Ray? and something else) with his daughters.

Dave Lyle brought a number of sport models, including an Estes Sizzler. It has a great paint job (neatly fading from one color to another) and just has a few scratches around the nose cone after its flight. He tried to get my Geo Metro, but landed a couple feet away. ;-)

Aaron lyle launched his Estes Skywinder a couple times on C6-3s (due to the wind). It flies great. I really like this model, but prefer to use C6-5s on a calmer day.

Mark Smieske brought along his little red wagon full of rockets, but couldn't get his launch system to work, so he launched from my pad.

Dan Wolf tested a few models for a demonstration launch he was going to fly at his daughter's school the following week. One was a sliding-wing rocket glider and another was a Rocky Mountain Canary(?) boost glider. Both flew well (on 'A's, I think) and I have since heard that the demos went very well.