V2 explosion

Thinking about the hobby store reminded me of a frustrating adventure back home.  I had purchased an estes semi-scale V2 model rocket. Not the V2-Max (though I did have one of those as well), but the smaller one.  It was the first model rocket I was proud of.  Spent a couple weeks in dad's shop building it and perfecting the body. YES weeks.  Then, another couple of weeks on the perfect, authentic camo paint job.  It was a work of art.  A few friends and I (Jason and Ryan Fink, and Richard Kleinbrink) went to Gyro Park to launch it.  We setup the launch pad, I loaded it with the largest C motor I could put my mitts on, a C6-7 I think, and launched it.

I was out of the fiber glass wadding, so I used a couple of old polyester socks, I was young and wasn't thinking of the thermal properties of polyester, my concern was the plastic parachute.

It was an unusually calm day, we counted down, swooosh, and off it went.  The rocket hit the coasting phase, things were looking good.  All of a sudden boom.  My rocket exploded on its maiden flight.  I think the polyester socks fused to the body and the pressure of the ejection charge was too much.  I didn't have the heart to launch any of my other rockets ever since. We ended up doing much more dangerous things with the leftover motors...picture die-cast cars, duct tape and long empty allies.... or action figure du jour and duct tape and long empty allies ....

I think I should get back into rocketry again we can get the larger motors now and some of the stuff is just too cool for school....


More Later....
G.