This blog covers the day to day progress of water rocket development by the Air Command Water Rockets team. It is also a facility for people to provide feedback and ask questions.

Monday, August 01, 2011

G2 launch report

I've updated the main website with the launch report from this weekend. The update includes photos and a highlights video from the two G2 flights we did on the day.

The update is here: http://www.AirCommandRockets.com/day109.htm

I'll soon be posting build progress updates as we get rolling on phase 2 of the G2 project.

Right, time to get back to the workshop...

7 comments:

Unknown said...

Hey George,

Really is a hell of a bird that G2 :) It's a shame about that arching over on the second flight it would have been interesting to see how high it got :P

I'm looking forward to seeing the progression of the boosters when you start work on them, are you going to run G2 with a jet-foaming insert with the boosters?

Enjoyed the Westernationals vids:)

Regards Doug

dan b said...

Im loving the G2 George for god sake hurry up with the boosters your nothing but a tease!!!!! hahahah keep up the good work mate

Dan B

George Katz said...

Cheers guys, :)

@Doug: Yes that is the intention to use the jet foaming spacer with the rocket. We are going to add a spliced pair to the bottom of the stack as the mixing chamber, so the the rocket will end up around 19L. We don't know what size nozzle yet, but we'll do a couple of static tests on the load cell to see what thrust and duration we can get out of different ones. I like the nice long burns.

@Dan: Heh heh ... yeah it has taken us a while to get to this stage. :) But with all the other things now done, our focus is on getting the boosters made and fitted. We also need to upgrade the launcher and release head. I too am keen to see it fly. Good luck with your boosted flights!

Vicente Garcia M Junior said...

Excellent launch the acceleration must have been enormous in the initial moments of flight, I was impressed, it seemed a pyro rocket. I and all the water rocket enthusiasts were waiting for that flight, so we thank you for the beautiful pictures and congratulate the success of the project.

A big hug to everyone on the team.

Vincent (fogueteh2o.blogspot.com)

George Katz said...

Thank you Vicente. :)

The acceleration is actually quite modest, as we are only using a 16mm nozzle. While on the launch tube the acceleration is around 5G, and just after the launch tube it jumps to about 9G and increases to about 16G at burnout.

It does sound pretty cool though. You can really tell the difference between a low pressure launch and a high pressure one. :)

Good luck with your upcoming launch!

MariusD said...

Hi George,
Very nice flight! I was looking for a higher altitude ;). But no damage news is good news!
It seems (from video) that at second flight you had a higher oscillation from the vertical axes, with slow wind condition. Maybe this is why it didn't get higher.
Congrats. Keep up the good work!
Marius

George Katz said...

Hi Marius,

Yes the rocket didn't go quite vertical on the second launch which would have contributed to the lower altitude. We already had the rocket tilted about 5 degrees away from everyone, but from the video it does look a little more than that. The rocket also looks like it fish-tailed a little as well which would have also washed off some speed. We're just happy it stayed together, and doesn't need repairs. :)