Sugar Shot To Space

(Guys do we have a thread for them already?)

Anyway, some news:

Sugar Shot to Space
NEWS:
*Richard has completed refurbishment of the DSS BPS nozzle and Midbulkhead, and completed the Forward Bulkhead assembly. A tool has been made to facilitate installation and removal of the Midbulkhead. Pictures posted in the "DoubleSShot BP - Static Test 2" album.

*Craig Peterson has performed additional battery testing (under vacuum and ambient conditions).

*Ben Brockert has completed CAD modeling of the DSS BPS motor. Picture postedin the "DoubleSShot BP - Static Test 2" album.

Our latest test of the DSS BPS motor resulted in a CATO.
We are in the process to determine the cause and corrective measures.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NuxTAv71Xac

Rick

Loving all the facebook update btw

Thanks Rob,

We are preparing two short motor tests for next month. One will be for testing a more conventional propellant grain geometry and the other to test a replacement for our mid bulkhead delay grain. The machining of all the parts and casting of propellant should be complete in the next couple of weeks. I'll also update here after we do the tests.

Rick

2013.05.08 NEWS

*The DSS TM-1 rocket motor was test fired on Saturday May 4th, as scheduled, at the FAR Test Site in the Mojave Desert. Rick Maschek and Paul Avery arrived early Saturday morning to assemble the motor, install it into the horizontal test stand that Rick had fabricated earlier, and to set up video and instrumentation.

TM-1 is a 6” (152mm) N-Class rocket motor configured with two BATES grains, having a total propellant mass of 30 lbs (14 kg). The objective of this test firing was intentionally kept very basic – to test fire a simple motor loaded with 6” BATES grains with ventilated casting tubes (to facilitate pressure equalization around the grain). As such, it was decided not to use the CSD for this test; a simple forward bulkhead was used to close off the motor.

The only instrumentation was an analogue pressure gauge to display chamber pressure, which was to be video recorded. The pyrogen igniter design, however, was a new innovation being tested for the first time.

The motor ignited when the ignition button was depressed. The motor came up to pressure rapidly, emitting a torrent of thick white smoke that spilled along the ground as the motor fired forcefully. The burn appeared to be nominal, with burnout coming approximately 8 seconds later, with the thrust clearly “tailing off” over the latter few seconds. Inspection of the motor indicated that all was nominal, and a good recording of the pressure gauge was obtained. Tear-down of the motor by Paul indicated a lot of combustion slag in the chamber. The cardboard casting tubes fared quite well.

Video of DSS TM-1static firing:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ykLyrmrDKg8
Second video (produced for FAR):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CP2SrOol58s
(videos courtesy Rick Maschek)