Another Day at FAR.

Rain from the Mountains

Another day on the amateur range.  We watched a couple static tests and a couple flights.  A static test means that the rocket is stationary, i.e. static - not static electricity. It is for testing engine performance before flight.

The static tests were from one of the FAR founders.  It was actually two tests of the same hybrid dedicated since the first test failed.  Click here for the videos, first test and the second test.

Student Rocket

A group of students from Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo, were there with three rockets. Two for testing and a large one, maybe 12 ft. long. The day was getting long so they only flew one of the test rockets.  The purpose of the flight was to test parachute deployment and only one of the parachutes opened.  They proceeded to fly the larger rocket anyway. It flew beautifully, click here for a short video of it, but neither chute opened and it experienced a hard landing.  We did not stay long enough to be the remains but while driving away we could see the students out in the desert brush.  They had the main chute opened in the wind and it looked fully intact so hopefully they have some salvageable pieces.

Earlier in the day one of the local rocketeers demonstrated how the different propellants burned with different colors depending on the ingredients.  I have a short video of one of the propellant scraps burning.  Click here for the complete photo album. 

The next step is to build our own.... already in progress.