Wet but productive weekend

Unfortunately we didn't get to test fly the servo timers this weekend as it pretty much rained both days. We had over 100mm at our place. So it was a good time to spend in the workshop. We are trying to build up our inventory of spare parts so we can focus on flying rather than fixing. I'm also trying to get components ready for rockets to fly at Williams later this year.

We are making a big run of spliced quads at the moment that will be fiberglassed, both 90mm and 110mm. This weekend we cleaned, cut, shrank and curled some 70 bottles.

Here they have been shrunk and are ready to be curled.

After curling they have been paired up ready for sanding and gluing. This should give us about 10 x 110mm quads and about 11 x 90mm quads.

We also fiberglassed two more 110mm spliced quads yesterday. These will be used as spares on the flight day of G2. We have 6 of these now, with 4 of them still needing to be pressure tested to 270psi. Some of the fiberglassed 90mm spliced quads are going to be used in Acceleron V's sustainer. I'm looking forward to this flight as it will be our first dual pressure launch.

We also made a new 90mm nosecone with the Servo Timer II which uses the small LiPo batteries. This new nosecone including the fairing it sits on weighs in at 86 grams. Our regular nosecones weigh around 154 grams. The nosecone also uses a new ejection plate mechanism that has more force to get the parachute out. I'll post details and photos with the next web page update. We are using the same technique for ejecting the G2's backup parachute.

We are currently planning to launch the G2 with just 3 spliced quads (~15L) on the first flight, just in case the rocket again decides to drill a fence post hole. If the first flight goes OK, then we will screw in the fourth bottle and launch again.