Balloon Launch Discussion

Team Balloon Launch Systems and construction and system Dynamics.

What I see not beeing at rocket scientist at all is

pros: less air ressistance wich will save fuel.
Shorter distance to space, but since orbit is speed not distance you dont gain much there.

cons: uncertan launch point = more problems with reaching correct orbit.
uncertan launch environment. When I read about alle the trubles it gives Armadillo just moving their rocket across the cuntry I can just imagine what moving it up in uncertan weather conditions can do.

I probably missed a lot so feel free to correct me
yours marius

Marius
We are working on this and if you keep track here more will be reviled as we progress with this design. We are about to do a balloon launch and you will see from the data that we get whats really happening. Our platform will develop as we test hardware. Hey, we may have to change the plan I don't know yet. We intend to find out.

Monroe

Dave Hein
How is the testing of the tracking system comming? I still need to build the Gas Genarator, as soon as I finish up on these parts for Richard Nakka and SS2S. Did you get the gps unit yet? The map calibration still is a consern. I saw the track you had and that looked pretty good. How long did that battery hold out in the end? I want to be ready to launch next weekend will that work for you?

Monroe

Marius
Are you on the team? Just asking because I can't be sure at the moment. Comments and Questions are welcome. I'm waiting for all the members to get here, before we start. Non-rocket scientist are welcome and encouraged here.

Monroe

Monroe,

I want to run one more test to see how much longer the battery will last. I currently have 1.5 hours on the battery, and it still has some charge remaining. I haven't gotten a GPS unit yet. I'm trying to decide whether to go with the cheapest USB unit that will serve our purposes or go with a more expensive GPS unit that I can use for other things. Next weekend sounds good to me.

Dave

Dave
Wow! that's long enough to work. That's so strange? You know that the one I had didn't work very long at all. Hummm? What is the brand name of the one you have? The one I had was a RS lithium battery. I have plenty of battery's for the video camera. If the battery you have will work that's really good. Are you interested in adding your little transmitter to the test? By the way I have a Cannon PowerShot that we could use along with the video. I can modify it if you know were to get the software. Do you think we should add the weight of a camera and your little transmitter? I have a 600g balloon. We could get a 1200g if we need to. What do you think?

Monroe

I am using an Ultralife Lithium 9V battery I bought at Radio Shack. It has a 1200 mah capacity. The Sonde uses about 200 ma, so the battery should last for about 6 hours.

It would be nice to include the Canon PowerShot cammera. If you have the right model the firmware to control it is as at http://chdk.wikia.com/wiki/CHDK .

I don't think we need to use the BeeLine tracking transmitter. The signal from the Sonde unit should be enough to track it.

Dave

Dave
That's the same exact battery I used? I didn't check the date code. Will have to check it for the Launch battery. So the stills are worth getting ok I'll get to work on that. I was just wondering if the beeline would be good at 100k. Anyway the sonde has insulation in it if we can keep it all inside the sonde it should stay toasty in there. I'll dissasemble the camera and see if I can make it fit in there.

Monroe

Monroe
Sorry I did'nt see it was a team forum when I posted the reply and im not on your team. I was just making at general comment to get the discussion going. I am certan that you know what you are doing and I salute your progress.
yours Marius

Did you want observations/comment from outside of the team?

If you are open for general comment, I'd say one of the major advantages of balloon launch is the increased ability to design your nozzle for optimum efficiency because of the narrowed range of atmospheric pressures experienced by the rocket.

Though this is off topic, can you make an aerospike nozzle on a SRB? As this would eliminate most or all of the previously mentioned advantage.

MisterQED
Team Daedalus

Sure! Everyone is welcome to join in on the fun! We don't want to ignore anyone. But we may not be able to answer everyone so be aware. We will try our best and see how it goes.

Monroe
The aerospike is interesting and we could discuss that in the motor thread. We will be staying on topic in the team forms. To aid our concentration. We may have to ignore off topic request but the hang out should be a good place to ask any question.

The advantages of balloon launch for the amateur are very appealing for many reasons. The draw backs are in station keeping and just where the launch will occur we will be addressing these issues.

Monroe,

I picked up a Canon A470 camera today at Walmart. It was $79 ($85.52) with tax, which is comparable to prices that I saw online. I loaded CHDK on an SD card, and it booted up fine on the camera. CHDK adds lot's of nice features to the camera. I used the script feature to run a Basic program that snaps a picture every 5 seconds. It worked like a charm!

It would be great if we could fly the camera on the balloon. We could write a script that captures video for a half-minute during the ascent, and then it would switch to taking stills for the rest of the flight. The only drawback to this camera is that it weighs 7.5 ounces. I might be able to take off some of the outer skins of the camera to remove an ounce or two.

Which Canon PowerShot do you have? If it's a lighter camera it might be better to use it for the launch. What do you think?

Dave

Dave
Thats great! My powershot is not supported. What do you think? You have a sonde can you figure something out? I have lots of fresh Lithium AA's we can use. Let me look up the max lift for the 600g balloon. We do want it to assend as fast as possiable and burst so it doesn't travel to far also our maps can be smaller.

Monroe

Monroe,

I also have a FlyCamOne2 that can record either video or pictures for about 20 minutes. If I add a larger battery we could record hours of pictures. The still image resolution is 1280x960, but it doesn't have a very good lens. The quality is basically the same as a cell phone's quality. The good news is that it's very light, so we may want to use this on the first flight instead of the Canon camera.

I also thought about using the BeeLine again. It will run for over 36 hours, and it might be good to include it as a backup for the sonde. If we can get within a mile of the landing spot we should be able to find it with the BeeLine, even if the sonde is no longer transmitting.

If we do anything more than just the sonde we should probably package everything inside of a small styrofoam cooler like others have done.

Dave