Egg Lofter away! Yeah, there were a lot of egg lofters here today. Imagine that!?
Good return on a test flight (that's wadding in the lower left of the picture)
Here you can see the growing crowd
Liftoff! Some teams used BP motors, some composite motors. Some used single motors, some used multi-stage and some, like this one, used clusters. It was ALL good!
Preping the model on the pad.
And we have liftoff!
The moment of truth.
Here is another cluster entry
One team poses with their entry
Flew fantastic too! (I don't have any of the numbers, but expect them to be available at some point)
This is a two stage model that encountered many problems throughout the day. In this flight, an underpowered booster resulted in a near stalled staging causing the sustainer to be unstable.
She recovered well in any event, so there was no damage to the rocket or payloads.
Another test flight for this design.
High contrast picture against the gray sky
Alright, where do I put the time? Right there, on that line! What line?! Over there. No! You're doing it all wrong! You put this there, add that, carry the 2, and... no! Not like that, here, give me that...
Yeah, it was a fun day!
Isn't it supposed to be doing something???
Woosh! Off it goes!
Whew! Almost missed this one! (these launch pictures are darker as I had my camera set for a very fast shutter speed and it was very overcast)
Good deployment!
The second and last launch of this beast. Very similar to the earlier flight but she staged ok this time. Problem is, the motor seemed to either be too far recessed or it may have actually moved as it produced no thrust and gutted the lower part of the model.
Here you can see the model just as it hit the ground, the lower 8 inches of the model were in flames.
Bill and I run out to it only to discover that it is as bad as it looks...
The remains. Fortunately only the lower portion of the model was affected so the altimeter was salvaged.
We had to move our launch location to this spot (we were way back by the truck there) as the wind was taking the models too near a residential area
Another great launch!
My best launch shot of the day, a G motor!
Great recovery too!
The Weare team #4100 poses with their rocket. During their last qualification flight they recorded an altitude of *exactly* 800.0 feet. Perfect!
One of the last launches of the day. Man, I love those smokey motors!