By the time I got it 'ready,' I'd lost the safety key for the controller. My improvised substitutes (a paper clip) didn't cut it, so I called the hobby store to see if they sold them. Not separately, and it turns out the controller by itself at the hobby store is more than the whole kit at Wal-Mart.
So back to Wal-Mart, I now have two rockets, one with an altimeter and one without. Same controller to fire both.
Em was skeptical, sure that anything Dad wanted to do must be dumb. It turned out to be tricky to photograph, because the controller takes two hands (one for the safety key), and I didn't want Mo to get up close and end up in the ER explaining how my nine-year-old got a solid fuel rocket burn.
But when the first rocket went up, Em was a believer. For one thing, it's so sudden. We did the countdown and when it fired, it was all I could do to pick it out in the sky. Well, that first one, the one without an altimeter, I must not have gotten enough wadding in between the engine and the recovery parachute, because it burned four of the six lines to the chute and came down with the grace of a thrown rock.
I fired both with C-6-5 engines, pretty much the max either rocket is intended for. For those who (like me) have forgotten from their time in Cub Scouts, a 'B' is twice the thrust of an 'A,' and a 'C' is twice the thrust of a 'B.' The second number has to do with Newtons, or something like that, that can be read and forgotten before you look away. It's the kind of confusing gibberish you hear with people comparing horsepower and 'torque' in cars. The third number is easy, the number of seconds after the engine is burned up before it fires the recover parachute.
How high? Well, according to the second rocket, almost 1000 feet, which is the limit on how high you can go before you have to tell the FAA that you're not a terrorist BUT...
Em loves the rockets now, but she didn't want to do any more after tracking down the first two. The second parachute opened properly, so the rocket coasted a good ways on the ride down. I'd guess we walked a quarter mile to get it, across a freshly ploughed field (sorry Mr. Farmer)...
2 comments:
After I read the first story, about how you gathered riches beyond your wildest dreams, with your tax refund, I've begun to use the phrase, "Two kites and a bottle rocket", as a replacement for the phrase, "Tax refund".
I know they aren't bottle rockets, but it rolls off the tongue better than: Two kites and a 'Ready-to-Fly' model rocket that needed AA batteries that weren't included, a philips head screwdriver, masking tape, sandpaper, and the recovery wadding and parachute that were in separate packages, the nose-cone wasn't attached to the shock cord.... oh yeah, I forgot about the Mountain Dew.
Even though the complete definition is the tip-off that we're talking about, "I have been there before! Amen brother!", I'm pretty sure the short version will still bring a similar memory to millions of people.
Two kites and a bottle rocket does have a nice ring to it. A use-all term for a windfall that isn't impressive, I think the language needs that.
We've all been stoked about something that turned out to be a disappointment, right? Isn't that 'two kites and a bottle rocket?' Spend a bunch of dough on tickets to a band and they suck, two kites and a bottle rocket, what did you expect? Meet a chick online, think you've connected with someone real and who's like you, to find out she has an Adam's apple and a pissed off ex-wife, two kites and a bottle rocket.
And you're such a flatterer with this 'millions' of people. Dozens would be an overstatement, if you're talking people who come to Lobster Land.
But you rock, Fancy Dirt, and I appreciate you encouraging my behavior that way...
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