Today was a sad day. We lost our rocket to the evil clutches of Midkiff roof. Our rocket didn’t make air during the first attempt. However, after our second launch attempt, our rocket flew over the trees next to Midkiff and onto the roof, where we were unable to retrieve it. The cone didn't come off of the rocket until it landed; therefore the parachute did not get a chance to open. An occurring problem is that our rocket is unable to travel on a straight path. Possibly, because it reaches such a great height and there is also the contributing weather conditions. Though we lost our rocket, we did manage to fulfill the minimum time requirement with a total of 5.3 seconds of airtime.
Although rope lassos and wind chants were considered, the best decision was to make an entirely new rocket with appropriate adjustments; a difficult challenge, but not impossible. Putting so much work into this rocket and losing it to a roof is definitely devastating, but we at least know how to make adjustments this time. We found good ways to create fins, rocket-attachable cones, and a sufficient parachute (when deployed). The main adjustment that should be taken into consideration is putting some sort of mass within the cone. By doing this, the chances of the cone detaching would be greater, which would hopefully allow the parachute to deploy and create an overall greater flight time.
Wind chants?? ea ea ea :) Maybe you can check if it fell down today. Hopefully you can get your rocket back! I think the mass would be good. If you want I have some extra modeling clay that you can use in class. Just let me know
ReplyDeleteEPIC FAIL!!! I too feel very devastated of what happened, and I checked... the rocket is still nestled on top of Midkiff. And, keeping with Makana's upbeat optimism, we can rebuild a new rocket with what has been learned my this failed attempt.
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