ROC July 2000 Launch

With ROCstock last month and LDRS just getting over with I thought that the July launch would be small, but I was fooled. The weather was great and so was the flying. Starting off the day we had Chuck Platista with his LOC Bruiser on an Aerotech L-850 off pad 39A for a great flight. Not to be outdone George Perez launched his R&D Sky Raider on an Aerotech L-1120 to an altitude of 6871'. A 10' Rocket Rage chute deployed at apogee to safely bring it back to earth. Rich Silva had the most number of flights with 13. Mike, Scott and John Kerrigan of Rocket Dynamic Systems were there with 8 flights of their kits all with Rocket Rage chutes. Do we see a partnership in the future? Our long lost friend Roland Wheeler showed up after a long absence to fly. Nice to see you Roland!

We had 6 level 1 and 2 level 2 certification attempts. They included Bruce Hay with a King Blobbo on an I300, Roy Knyrim with a Pterodactyl Jr. on a H123, Chris Bowes with a Tethys on a H123 and Richard Pirtle with a Callisto on a H123. We had 2 brothers, Dirk and Erik Gates also go for it with a Sudden Rush on an I211 and a Nimbus on another I211, respectively. Both used dual deployment. Nice way to go for a level 1 cert (Dirk later earned level 2). For level 2 we had Bill Farr with his custom built "Spectrac" on a J350 and custom electronics. Good flight and welcome to the big spenders! Also the long anticipated flight of Brad Williams scratch-built Phoenix. It is a 4" by 13Lbs. beauty on a K185. This thing should be in a museum. He had dual AltS2's and dual Rocketman R7 chutes for deployment. Perfect flight but when he brought it back he was bummed. The bottom of the rocket had a little scorching! Mine get more scorched then that just sitting in the California sun! Nice going to all that certified.

Do you all remember the Estes Red Max? Well Larry Taylor brought his Red Max out of mothballs for it's first launch since 1978. Still flies great! Not to be outdone Roy Knyrim Launched his Original Rockets Red Max, a 4" upscale, on a G64 for a nice flight. Joseph Van Horn had a scratch-built Black Brandt IV flying on 4 C6-5's and then turned right around and did it again. Another cluster flyer Jeff Gortatowsky flew his Nighthawk with 3 H124 motors also Grover Eason flew 3 H180's in his scratch-built Blue Rage II. Larry "Bubba" Jacobs flew his crowd pleasing "Triple Trouble" with 3 D12's. It was a good flight but you get no points for bouncing it off the president's truck. I still have the red marks on my truck to prove it!

Troy Monroe Stacey launched "Certifiable" on a J350 with a Missile Works RRC2 for apogee deployment. Mark Ferguson flew his two-stage Quantum Leap with an I357 in the booster and a H180 in the sustainer but had a separation. Bill Seiders flew the "Draino Dart Grande", made from black PVC pipe, with a K1100. Hybrid flight for the day was Wayne Mrazek with his rocket named "Passing Wind". He flew this on the Hypertek Earthquake L490 for a crowd-pleasing flight.

We had so many flyers that they are too numerous to mention but our Motor Usage this month is as follows...

Motor Usage for July 2000

    1/10A    0
     1/4A    0
     1/2A    0
        A    3
        B    5
        C   32
        D   23
        E   14
        F   15
        G   31
        H   31
        I   23
        J    9
        K    3
        L    3
        M    0
      ---------
           192

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