Jul 7, 2011

Back up and Running

To those of you who follow the ARC I apologize for not posting more of the current build.  We have had to move and rebuild the shop in a smaller area, (.e garage).  Thanks to the generosity of my wife, Karen.
 Currently we are in the process of painting the 8 inch version MLAS and finishing the upper shroud section of the 2 foot boiler plate. This has proved a difficult process due to the three different angles on the shroud.  I would like to give credit to Gordy Agnello at Excelsior Rocketry, for providing the scale drawings for us to follow; he made it easier to construct the pattern.  I would like to also thank Tim Wilson for his input.
As many of you know we are designing the rocket with the original 20 degree canted motors CRAZY I know, but why not. In doing this we have had to solve many problems, one being how to attach the motor tubes to the cage without adding a whole lot of extra weight.
Solution: We have designed a honeycomb structure in the boost skirt. This design has held a 225 lb man on it. This structure only added a few lbs and gave us the strength we needed, it also allowed us to cant the motors like the original.  It also made everything removable and repairable, which is needed in a scale like this one.  I will go more into this shortly, with pictures describing the design.
The parts we need are being designed and produced in house, we have a lot of blue DuPont foam lying around. So we use the extra pieces to form the plug we need for parts. Then we vacuum bag the fiberglass and modify the parts as needed. This seems to be the cheapest way to make what we need. I will also describe this process later this weekend.
 We have had people donate money toward the build, the plan is to have a shirt made with the information and a picture for people to purchase, and this will help support the launch of the half scale version. 

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