...
Payload
Propulsion
Thrust Curve
...
Ignition Transient
The motor took significantly longer to light than previous tests, including the second P motor test that used an identical igniter with twice the significantly more propellant . In the P motor test, the igniter lit the motor in less than a second because it was held in the core surface area. During static fires the igniter was retained by gravity until the motor had built up enough pressure to push eject it out. The smaller flight motor was almost certainly slower to light because the . Video evidence shows that the igniter fell out of the motor within a second of firing and thus was only able to light a small portion of the propellant. This theory is supported by the video as you see a bright spot hit the ground shortly after the ematch is heard popping. To prevent this from happening, make sure the igniter includes some faster-burning substance like pyrogen, uses more propellant dust , or is held to the stick with extra wire or something that won't burn like the tape did. Though just a minor inconvenience on a single stage flight, ignition time becomes much more critical on a .
Future efforts could faster-burning gas generators (pyrogen or BKNO3), higher surface area propellants (pixie dust), or additional mechanical retention. While chffing represents a minor issue on this flight, successful, rapid, and complete ignition is a necessary technical milestone for multistage flight. Care must still be taken to not overpressurize the motor, though, so unless it is determined to be essential to a flight, a relatively slow igniter is not a problem and is the safer solutionrespect the structural limits of the motor case.
Recovery
Piston Deployment
...
Main
E-match voltage anomaly
Post flight data review notes abnormal voltage readings on Telemetrum apogee channel. Despite commanding an apogee event, the Telemetrum continued reading 4.2V across the channel for the remainder of flight. The e-match should register a significant increase in resistance within 10 mS of exceeding it's no-fire current of no fire current here. This suggests that the initiator misfired. A fishbone analysis was conducted to classify the nature of the issue. Evidence collection is ongoing, however it appear probable that the Telemetrum e-match is internally shorted, either autogenously or to the piston.
Structures
Integration
Integration began at roughly 1:30 pm PST and the rocket arrived on the pad at roughly 3:00 pm PST.
...
- Having a good checklist would have been beneficial, even though we likely wouldn't have been able to integrate the rocket in the amount of time that we were given before the end of the launch window if we had been following a strict checklist.
- Regular batteries are NOT enough to fire 2 e-matches in parallel. We ran into this problem during the ground test, as well as a previous static fire.
Times are indicated as T+ or T- from the first vertical motion on the rail (liftoff). Times are indexed off of the nadir (aft) facing Mobius camera. The zenith camera timestamps lag by 4.076s. Values are taken from either Pyxida or TeleMetrum data. Most StratoLogger data was unavailable to the author of this document.
...