Notes from 28 Sep 2013 Amesbury launch

Well, I had two interesting launches of the DX3. Both were set up for dual deploy.

1. A bad igniter on the apogee charge gave me a failed booster separation (apogee was around 840'), but the main fired fine at 700', so no damage. Note to self: checklist for igniters is: select, inspect, install. I think I missed that second step. I recall the LCO calling out that I should check my altimeter calibration - nope, that wasn't the issue, just a bad igniter.

2. The second flight was a good dual deploy, but I also recall Kenn B saying 'not sure what happened' over the loudspeaker. The flight data made what happened pretty clear: The rocket only flew to 729', at which point the drogue charge fired and I had booster separation (tethered only, no chute). Since I had main deploy set to 700', the main deployed almost immediately thereafter, so I can see why from the ground it looked like everything happened at once. It pretty much did! But it was a nominal dual deploy flight and a good recovery.

Both flights were on H motors that I had seen around 1000' altitude on calm days at Berwick - but Saturday I think the wind ate some of my altitude. But that said, I'm going to fly the DX3 on an I motor on Saturday - it is a fairly massive rocket for a paper and wood type, especially with the extra 500+ grams of mass that the altimeter bay adds, and H is somewhat underpowered.

I did not get good telemetry from my XBee, both times because of pilot error. The first time I had a loose connection on my ground station - I unpacked it, but didn't inspect the connections. On the second flight, I was late getting back to my ground station to restart the acquisition software - by the time I did so, bird was already in the air and I lost my opportunity. I've already made some changes to the ground station configuration to make it less error prone, so hopefully I'll get real time plotting of the altitude data on Saturday at Berwick.

Carmine was again very happy to be junior assistant LCO and help press the launch button while I was on RSO duty - thanks to Bob K and Boris K for letting him help out.

- Matt