IRW+2010

=INTERNATIONAL ROCKETRY WEEK IRW2010 (LARGS, SCOTLAND)=

This year would be the first time since 1994 that my son David would not join me at the IRW!! This year it would just be my Dad and myself in the caravan camping at South Whittleburn farm as we did back in 2008.

Andy had arrived on Wednesday and Sean and I arrived Thursday. The weather had been good earlier in the week and there had been some good flights.The forecast was looking ok for the Friday, rubbish for Saturday and good for Sunday.

We set up the caravan and settled down to a few cold beers to listen to the young lad playiing the bag pipes who was from the caravan next to us. He was practicing for a competition the next day. He was good too! A nice welcome to Scotland greeting for us.

Some of the images on this site have been taken by other rocket nuts! Here are some links to thier images:- Hammy's: [] Andy Moore: []# Phil Handley: []# Martyn Turner: [] Johnathan's: []





Sean was planning to fly his upscale Estes Thunderhawk on an L720 (54mm) Ceseroni. He was also going to fly his newly built PITA on an I285 and Screaming-ab-dabs on a J330.

I had re-built the upscale Estes Delta Clipper to fly on a K940 (4 grain) staged to a J330. Both Ceseroni motors. This had flown at the IRW 2000 and IRW 2001 events. Biggest launch to date was on a K100T to J570W using Areotech motors at IRW 2001

Image below shows Sean's PITA (Pain In The Arse...!) ready to go on an I285 (38mm) Ceseroni motor. The flight was high (3000 feet) and it ripped of the pad!





Pad cam of the PITA: [|IRW2010_PITA_padcam1.wmv]

The fins on my upscale Estes Delta Clippe had always been a weak point in the design. The original fins were made from foamex. Although light they would break off sometimes in flight (not good!). I replaced the fins with a very strong yet still quite light Dibond material. This is a Perspex sheet bonded either side with aluminium sheet.

The 1st stage chute would be ‘pulled’ out at separation. Plenty of fire blanket was used to protect the chute from the flame of the second stage. The booster was tied to the underside of the upper stage with a piece of wire rope. The final connection to the motor mount was with a sacrificial tie wrap. This would break when the chute and wire were fully extended. Sadly, this did not work as planned! The booster was blown off too early by ignition of the upper stage before complete motor burnout. This appears to have ‘tumbled’ the booster violently with the effect of two fins becoming ‘air breaks’ in the process. These were ripped off within a fraction of a second. The booster then went into freefall. Careful selection of launch angle and experience allowed the damaged booster to land is a safe position away from the launch site. The landing position being within the area designated if things had gone wrong.

The upper stage carried on its way and was recovered successfully. Altitude was predicted for approx 6800 feet. The Gwhizz reported 4800 feet. 200 feet under predicted. I suspect the early staging reduced the maximum altitude quite a bit. The is no visible coasting stage in the onboard video or from video take from the ground. I launch the rocket again on the Sunday on a K940 only. This lifted off very quickly off the pad! Altitude was 3100 feet. The onboard video was nice again with the Mini DV MD80 cameras. Malcolm, of Rockets ‘n’ things, was not going to arrive until late Friday, so I had to modify the booster to fly on a K660 Ceseroni (6 grain) instead which we already had in stock. This meant making the interconnecting coupler longer to accept the longer motor.













Images below curtosy of an IRW rocketeer! Thanks! These two images are of Sunday's launch on teh single stage K940 (54mm) Ceseroni motor.


 * [[image:IRW_2010_203.jpg width="722" height="1085"]] || [[image:IRW_2010_0057x.jpg width="720" height="1080"]] ||



Delta Clipper pad cam [|IRW2010_Delta_Clipper_padcam1.wmv]

Delta Clipper ground launch (slow motion video) [|IRW2010_Delta_Clipper_ground1.wmv]

Delta clipper ground launch video [|IRW2010_Delta_Clipper_ground_K660_to_J330_3.wmv]

Delta Clipper in flight K660 to J300 [|IRW2010_Delta_Clipper_inflight_K660_to_J330_1.wmv]

Delta Clipper in flight K940 [|IRW2010_Delta_Clipper_inflight_K940_1.wmv]

Below are a few grabbed images from the inflight video. The camera used was a Mini DV MD80. Virtualdub was used to grab the frames. Windows Live Movie maker was used to edit the video.

You can see that there is only one fin letf on the booster at separation. The motor was still going (just) and staged too early.
 * [[image:IRW_2010_DC_inflight_002.jpg]] || [[image:IRW_2010_DC_inflight_003.jpg]] ||
 * [[image:IRW_2010_DC_inflight_004.jpg]] || [[image:IRW_2010_DC_inflight_005.jpg]] ||
 * [[image:IRW_2010_DC_inflight_006.jpg]] || [[image:IRW_2010_DC_inflight_007.jpg]] ||
 * [[image:IRW_2010_DC_inflight_008.jpg]] || [[image:IRW_2010_DC_inflight_009.jpg]] ||
 * [[image:IRW_2010_DC_inflight_010.jpg]] || [[image:IRW_2010_DC_inflight_011.jpg]] ||



The image above shows what little is left of the Dibond fins! They have been ripped off! You could not do this with tools easily!....Just shows what forces are at play.



Above shows Johnathan with his level 3 Hybrid rocket. The launch was a little unstable and the rocket went horzontal for a while. This caused the main chute to deploy, but was recovered ok. The flight was nice!

Ground lauch video of the rocket: [|IRW2010_M_Hybrid_ground2.wmv]



Below shows my Dad on the Largs Golf course. We had a great round of golf (Dad won!) It's a nice course too. It made a nice break from rockets and we had been wanting to play this course for years!









Above is the last of the Mosquitos! The other spacked in at IRW2007. This did not fair much better either, but the soft heather saved it.....who needs a parachute!

Mosquito ground launch [|IRW2010_Mosquito1.wmv]





Andy launch his Explorer on an H. It went high (3000 feet nearly) and landed back very close to the pad!!!

Andy's Explorer pad cam [|IRW2010_Explorer_padcam1.wmv]



Sean's Upscale Estes Thunderhawk was to fly on an L720 (54mm) Ceseroni motor. Altitude was going to be 6800 feet....in the end it got about 20 feet..!!

The motor ignited, but failed as it came to pressure. The aft closure sheared off with the thread of the casing. Not much was left of the rocket as can be seen from the images and videos.

Thunderhawk slow motion cato! [|IRW2010_Thunkerhawk_Cato_L720_1a.wmv]

Thunderhawk ground lauch video (well it did get off the ground......in bits!) [|IRW2010_Thunkerhawk_Cato_L720_2.wmv]

Thunderhawk cato (pad cam) [|IRW2010_Thunkerhawk_Cato_L720_padcam1.wmv]

Some still images below that have been grabbed from Hammy's great Slow mo video of Sean's Thunderhawk Cato!


 * [[image:IRW_2010_TH_CATO_001.jpg width="540" height="720"]] || [[image:IRW_2010_TH_CATO_002.jpg width="540" height="720"]] ||
 * [[image:IRW_2010_TH_CATO_003.jpg width="540" height="720"]] || [[image:IRW_2010_TH_CATO_004.jpg width="540" height="720"]] ||















Sceaming ab-dabs pad cam [|IRW2010_Screaming_padcam1.wmv]

Screaming ab-dabs in flight [|IRW2010_Screaming_inflight1.wmv]

Screaming ab-dabs ground lauch video [|IRW2010_Screaming_ground1.wmv]

Some grabbed frames from Sean's flight using Andy's key ring camera. One of the frames shows Largs and the Marina in the distance.
 * [[image:IRW_2010_SCREAM_001.jpg]] || [[image:IRW_2010_SCREAM_002.jpg]] ||
 * [[image:IRW_2010_SCREAM_003.jpg]] || [[image:IRW_2010_SCREAM_004.jpg]] ||

We had some great views near sunset as we came back down from Farlie Moor launch site near Largs.





Above shows Largs basking in the sunshine at sunset. The Waverly can be seen at the dock.



Image above is of Arran taken from the coast road by Irvine on the way home.