Rebel Rockets-Day 7

Today we built more tubes. We had to figure out a new way to fold the parachute because the way we were doing it before was not opening every time. The new way seems to work a lot better than the initial way. We actually finished a rocket today and went to the field again to test it. The purpose of this launch was to see if the parachute would actually deploy this time. The launch failed because we lost the rocket. It probably came down in pieces because we found the engine completely separated from the rest of the rocket. We did not find the rest of the parts so we had to take another trip to the hobby store to pick up cones and more fuses. We figured that the cones were too difficult to construct well enough, so we just decided to buy them prefabricated. Losing the rocket was pretty upsetting, and we viewed it as a step backwards.

-Christian

We built more rockets today first, then we had another launch. But the launch didn't work again, and the parachute never ejected, the reason we don't know, we couldn't find the rocket. We think it came apart because the engine fell out. Since we lost the rocket we had to get another cone for it, so we went to the hobby shop and got some more cones and fuses. It's pretty annoying the chute still didn't eject all we can really do is try to launch another rocket and hope for the best because even though our test worked, during the real one we still messed up. It's pretty disappointing we still haven't achieved a fully successful launch.

-Mike B.

Today we started by building more rockets and working on the prediction equations. The equations are nearly finished and the only information needed is that pertaining to the force of drag. This means that in the near future we will have to use the wind tunnel to test our rocket's drag. Then we will be able to make the equations and then predict the path the rocket will take. In the meantime we needed to check if the parachute would eject so we could save the accelerometer that would give us the data to check our predictions. We finished one of our rockets this morning and set off to do a test launch. The launch did not work out as we had planned, and the rocket fuselage was lost, as was the cone and parachute. The rocket may have not been able to withstand the force of the engine's backwards propulsion and could have broken apart. At least, we found the engine separated from the rest of the rocket. In the future, we will have to make the engine tighter in the rocket and find a way to make sure the parachute ejects correctly.

-Scott

We began today with more work on building rockets. We created more shells, and fins. We created new fin shapes for the next variable and further worked on the parachute. We then decided to test the parachute by launching a rocket. The launch did not go as planned. We lost he main rocket and were only able to recover the rocket engine. We then went to the hobby shop to purchase a new cone for the rockets we would be building.

-Ben W.

Today we began to build more fuselages and put some finishing touches one of them by adding fins, wadding, shock cord, and parachute that we were also testing. We wanted to make sure that the parachute will work this time so we decided to launch our second rocket. This time the launch did not go so well as the engine got seperated from the fuselage and parachute that we never were able to recover. So now we know that the engine needs to be secured better and another parachute apparatus is needed so it will stay attached to the cone and fuselage. Therefore, we went to the hobby shop in Danbury to get more cones and fuses for our next attempt.

-Kushal

After finishing up the rocket that we had begun building yesterday we decided to do another test to determine whether or not our recovery system was working. Sadly, it did not go as we had hoped. The rocket flew well, but the second charge of the engine backfired, pushing the engine itself out of the fuselage. The engine was recovered, but both the fuselage and recovery system were lost.

- Mike S.