Back To Normal Again

 The very day after my last post Castle Rock and Douglas County went right back to the burn ban restrictions.

There hasn't been a drop of rain in the past week and the wind has been at a high level every single day. The area is a virtual tinder-box!

Add to that the smoke plumes from a large wildfire on the Colorado/Utah border are blowing straight into the Colorado Front Range, making it unhealthy to be outside for any length of time.

Interestingly, there was a story on local news this morning about a nearby wildfire that was started by lightning - on a golf course!!

I would have thought that a well- manicured and irrigated place like that would be immune to fires. 

Guess not...

Anyway, the model rocket flying drought drags on as well.

A Quick Post For The Blog.

 Hi, All,

I haven't gone away from the BlastFromThePast blog, I'm only on a hiatus.

Fire burn bans have finally been lifted here in Castle Rock and Douglas County, but now the problem is that there hasn't been much in the way of decent flying weather sans brisk windy conditions.

With the continued drought and the increase in warmer summer temperatures, I'm sure it won't be long until we're back on burn bans.

The outlook for a Front Range group launch seems bleak at the moment, but I am on the eagle-eye lookout for a day when weather might be favorable to do a launch excursion.

The good news is that all the weather models I have been reading speak of an El Nino weather pattern developing in the Pacific.  This (hopefully) will serve to bring substantial amounts of moisture to Colorado beginning in late summer and extending through the fall and winter months.

We'll have to wait and see.

I also haven't much to report on rocket building activity.  I have a couple birds on the bench close to be ready for shooting primer but just haven't spent much time with getting them finished.

Jeez! I thought when I retired there would be much more time available for rocket building.

(Cue game show buzzer sound)

Family activity, yard work, honey-do projects, and music writing have been taking up a large chunk of my time.

Anyway, I just wanted to jump on the blog here and let you all know that things will get cranked up again in the near future.

Thanks for reading.  Keep 'em flying!

-Ed

BAck To The Bench !!

 This past week, I finally got my rear into gear and made the long trek to the basement La-BOR-atory to immerse myself in a bit of rocket construction.

My efforts resulted in getting the Nike-Smoke and the Nike-Apache ready for primer.

This session involved attaching the fins on the latter, applying fillets to both models, prepping the plastic parts, and filling in any spots on the fins where I might have missed some grain.

On a different subject, I've been reading some encouraging news on the rocket flying front.

Meteorologist are predicting a super El Nino weather pattern forming this year.

What this means is that drought-stricken Colorado will likely be seeing much more moisture beginning in the latter part of the year.

This also means that we should have respite from the non-stop fire danger burn bans imposed by the local municipalities, which are currently responsible for the lack of model rocket launching.

Guess it's time to spend more time in the shop and start stocking up on the motor inventory!

Cheers!

Happy 2026 !!

 Happy and prosperous New Year to all !! 

In keeping with my annual New Year tradition, it's time to post my look-back at the previous year's rocketry activity.

This year's post is very short indeed:

Launch sessions:        2

Rocket flights:            10

New rockets built:      0

I did manage to get a smattering of progress accomplished on a couple of outstanding builds, but not enough to get any of them completed and flight-ready.

So, for 2026 I'm quite ready to reverse this rocketry drought and get back into the swing of getting birds built and hitting the flying field again. After all, I'm coming up on my 10th anniversary of becoming a BAR. Gotta make it count. 

Stay tuned. Lots to come in 2026 !!

Cheers!

Still Vertical And Have A Pulse!

 For those of you who follow this blog, you probably have noticed how infrequently I have been posting here. 

No worries.  I'm still an avid model rocket buff. It's in my DNA!

The issue has been a necessary re-prioritization of my time and resources due to all of the recently changing life situations.

As if there is not enough to do already, I've added yet another large project to my plate.  You can read all about it at this link:

https://eddies7.blogspot.com/2025/12/a-brand-new-musical-adventure.html?m=0

This has added another major time redistribution exercise to my life.

This being said, I will, by EOY, at least get the remainder of the pics from last September's Front Range launch at Dove Valley posted here.

That has certainly been long-neglected!

Anyway, hang in there with me.

CHEERS!!

Launch Date: September 26th, 2025, PART 2

This is a continuation of the Dove Valley launch report started in the last post.

Please note that it is going to be continuously updated over the next week or so.  I have very limited computer time and a lot of photos to process, and captions to write. I mainly want to get as much material as I can posted here as soon as possible, and polish things up later.  Please bear with me and check back often.

One more note:  All of the photos in this post are accompanied by flight descriptions in each rocketeer's own words.

Enjoy....

       Cory Antosh: The first is a Squirrelworks Dogfight Rocket boost glider, which
would normally boost two gliders, but today was used to boost only one
glider at a time as I attempted my NARTREK Silver Glider duration flight.
The program requires a glider flight of 30 seconds or longer. After a flight
on a B6-2 that lasted about 23 seconds, this flight on a C6-3 resulted in a
66 second glider flight. The glider was recovered without damage. Thanks to
Rich Wallner for timing the flight.

Ed: "Upon arrival at the field, my first order of business was to flight-prep the one glider model I packed along.  This was the Rascal, a fixed-motor rocket glider built from a 1973 design.  Sadly, it didn't survive the nose-dive that it took on its fourth hand-tossed trim test.   Powered flight scrubbed for the Rascal today."

Pictured: The busted Rascal lying amongst the dog-turds...er...the lawn-aeration soil plugs!

"In its stead, I quickly prepped my old tried-and true fleet flagship EAC Viper.
Excellent 19th flight on a B6-4 motor!"
 

Mike Goss's launch day arsenal.

Mike Goss'sShuttle Express (far right in above photo): "This is a Craigslist Rescue Bird that came with a lot of other rocketry items.  All parts were there, the shock cord and mount were replaced with Kevlar and elastic, the parachute was fine and re-used with an added snap-swivel.  The gliders were both rebuilt, both had new rudders, and added tail weight.  One used the original wing with a wire to hold up the elevators, the other had a new wing made with elevators that are on wires to hold their position.  The launch was good on the B6-2, ejection was at apogee with both gliders being released, the Styrofoam wing settled into a tight flat spin, but the balsa winged one circled nicely and landed just after the rocket landed."

Jim Gazur:  "I recently acquired a collection of Flight Systems Inc. motors in original 3-packs (thanks JB!), which prompted me to want to fly some of the individual FSI motors I had collected over the years.  The pinnacle of the FSI black powder offerings, of course, was the F100.  Never mind that it's barely an F with about half the advertised 100 Newton average thrust, it was the most rip-snorting motor a teenager couldn't afford back in the early 1970's.  Given the unknown storage history of a nearly half-century old motor, I built a disposable rocket I wouldn't mind losing.  It uses a hogged-out Estes booster-55 fin unit (thanks Lee!), and a collection of tubing to work down from the BT-55 to the F100's oddball diameter of approximately 27mm.  

"Not surprisingly, at ignition the F100 spit the propellant grain out the front in 4-5 fireballs, somehow appropriate for a motor based on a skyrocket motor meant to lift 1-pound shells.  The Cato shredded the body tube, but it will be an easy fix to graft on a new one."

Rich Wallner:  "Estes Big Bertha on a B6-4.  My 2nd oldest rocket (built in 2006), which hadn't flown since 2016.  Good flight!"

Greg Hauser: "First launch was the Estes Echostar. B6-0, B6-6. Good flight. Probably needed a C6-0 lower stage to get it to go a bit higher."

Dave Bauer, more commonly known as 'Daddyisabar' on the forums, launched a Quest X-15 on a B6-4 motor for a great flight.  No photo available.

Ed: "The next model out of my tote was the ESAM-58 that had suffered a serious CATO mishap on its last flight. The bird now flies sans the lower tube and fins."

" Oddly, the parachute detached from the model after bringing it down to about 30 feet from the turf. Post-flight analysis revealed the shroud lines were twisted and the snap swivel had opened up on its own.  Model and parachute escaped un-harmed.  Very strange..."

Ed: My third and final flight for the day was turned in by the Estes Interceptor. Near- perfect flight on a C6-5 motor.

Earlier in the launch session I had noted that Greg had brought along his beautifully built Interceptor-E.  I had to get a pic of the two birds side-by-side....

MORE TO COME...Check in often!

Launch Date: September 26th, 2025, PART 1

 On Friday, September 26th, nine rocketeers from the Colorado Front Range converged on Dove Valley Regional Park in Centennial to launch some rockets on the large, well-manicured complex of soccer fields. This turned out to be a record turnout of participants from the group,

Temperatures at the field were a comfortable 75 to 78 degrees, southerly breezes fluctuated from 3 to 8 mph, and mostly clear skies with some high-altitude cloud cover. 

The field was deserted, save for the presence of a far-off grounds-maintenance crew...and a pair of robotic lawn mowers cruising about on their pre-programmed patterns...

...which leads us to the subject of this first post.

Participating rocketeer Lee Reep experienced a highly unusual outcome to his first flight of the day.

The story is best served in Lee's own words:

"My first flight of the day went to the Jet Freak, a boost glider I try to fly at every Dove Valley launch.  

I really thought this was its final flight. This was one to remember.  Boosted by an A8-3 motor, the glider flew a somewhat erratic path to the north, and at ejection, went into an erratic dipping and circling descent, eventually settling down about 100 yards north of the pads.  

And then along came one of the robot mowers - headed right towards it!

Of all the places the Jet Freak could land, and of all the paths the mower could take, it had turned and headed back straight for my glider.  I ran, but was too far away from it, before it disappeared from view!  The mower gobbled it up!  Or so I thought … There were no bits of bright yellow balsa thrown out the back with grass clippings.  No sign at all that it had even been eaten.  The mower proceeded on easily, turned around, and started heading back to the scene of the crime.  Somebody mentioned that they could see it (I was too shocked to remember who.) Rich Wallner stepped into the mower’s path, and it stopped.  (Apparently a bright fluorescent yellow glider was too small to cause the mower to stop.) 

There on a little deck above the mower blades sat my Jet Freak, looking intact! I pulled it out.  Not a scratch! 

Absolutely incredible that in the many acres of grass soccer filed, that glider would meander toward a spot that a robot mower would cross and scoop it up, resulting in a somewhat perfect flight.

This bird is a favorite of mine. It harkens back to the 80s at least, maybe the 70s.  Its design appeared in a club newsletter.  It was apparently designed by an 11- year-old kid! Everyone was impressed at its simplicity, and how well it flew.  When asked what he called it, he responded “Jet Freak”. Somebody from the club obtained the model's rough dimensions, and made a sketch, then published it in their club newsletter.  I can find the plan and send to the group if anyone wants to build one. A pretty good performer if trimmed properly, and very easy to build."

A couple of blogger's notes:

Thank you, Lee, for a most amusing flight and a great story write-up. Glad to see that the glider escaped Un-'Scythed' and lived to fly another day!

Thanks also to Rich Wallner for providing the photos and flight video. 

Last evening, I pored through the video footage to see if the actual 'encounter' between glider and mower was visible.  I clipped a frame of the video right at the point that the mower entered the field of view, then zoomed up to 600%.

The image is too far away and blurry to see the glider, or it had been gobbled up further to the right of the image, just before the mower came into view. 

Lee, 

I, for one, would definitely like to see those plans for the Jet Freak!

Don't forget to check back here on the blog over the next few days for further reporting on the rest of this Dove Valley launch session. 

Cheers!