The Nashville and Huntsville Rocketry clubs sponsor a weekend of rocket launching in Manchester. The dates are June 20th and 21st(weekend after Bonnaroo). I went in 2007, and it was really impressive and really fun. They will have pads for launching everything from the Estes type model rockets to Level 3 Certification rockets that require several people to carry them to the launch pad and the launch rail is made from sections of radio towers.

I am planning on going Saturday before our meeting. I plan to fly a small video camera as payload in a larger model rocket. It is about an hour drive from Nashville. Here is a link with launch area information : http://www.hararocket...

Here is a link with some pictures: http://www.hararocket...

These links are on the Huntsville club site. Unfortunately, Google reports the Music City Missile Club site to be infected with a virus as of Friday. Here is the Nashville club site with more information: http://www.mc2rocketr... --enter at your own risk. My browser gives me a warning before going to their site though.

It would be pretty cool to fly a small bot, land it, and have it exit the lander. Or do what the Vanderbilt group was working on... flying an RC drone as a payload, eject it at apogee, then fly it from the ground. Very cool stuff...

The Southern Thunder web page is up: http://www.mc2rocketr...

check it out and let me know if anyone wants to meet me out there.

I'm going to try to make it down there. Looks like the fun starts around 9 or 10? Hard to tell from the website what the schedule is!

I think the time between 9-10 is correct. I will be there around 10 am and will have a tent if anyone wants some shade.

Here is the on-board video from the rocket launch on Saturday. I think the quality was a bit better before it was uploaded to YouTube. If anyone has suggestions on how to maintain quality on upload to YouTube, please let me know. The rocket was a dynastar rising sun using a D12-5 estes engine. The camera is a Grayson Hobby camera bought from them online.

http://www.youtube.co... ( I had to leave the recovery antics in the video :) )

Now, I want to build a small flight computer to record altitude, acceleration, and sending tracking information back to ground.

That's really cool steve. I am envious of your cam. The rocket launch was great! Could you post the video to the "files" section? I definitely plan on being there again next year. How about that rocket with the "N" engine!

Hmm maybe I can come up with something to launch next year.
Patrick

PS- Should have some "Cat Blaster 2009" action footage posted tonight. ;-)

I tried uploading the video to the files section, but I think there is a 10 MB limit. The video is 50MB.

The next club launch is in July. I am going to try to go again. I want to build a 2 meter cw transmitter for tracking the rocket and fly it with a bigger engine. We should definitely come up with something to build for next year (or earlier). I saw that the Vandy group launched their RC plane at altitude just short of 1 mile.

http://frontweb.vuse....

I am looking forward to seeing Alex' pictures.

Rocket Launch Pictures link:

http://algomoose.smug...

Two crashes, a huge N class rocket and also Steve and Ryan's launches.

Steve - any guesses on your altitude? 300ft or so?

Great pictures! Thanks for sharing them!

300' seems so low-- but I think your estimate is right. The instructions said about 450' based on rocket simulation with a D12 engine. I need to fly it with a bigger engine at the next launch :)

Anyone going to the July 11th launch?