flying the Mach 10

This past weekend I flew my Centuri Mach 10 at our GARLO 2005 launch in Champaign, IL. I had a Mach 10 back in the early 70's and lost it in tall grass at a launch. I've always wanted another one and was lucky enough to find one, still in the bag, for sale at NARCON a few years ago. Since the theme for GARLO this year was "Winged Spaceships" it seemed appropriate to build it and fly it.

It went together very quicky. If I had used quick drying glue I suspect I could have put it together in a couple of hours. As it was I spent a few minutes each evening for about a week and got it built and trimmed.

One hard part was to know how much weight to put in the nose cone. The instructions say to fill it with clay, but some people had said that it still didn't really fly straight even with that weight. I calculated the weight of the clay that would fill the nose cone, it came to 18 grams, and put 20 grams of lead shot in the nose instead of clay. I figured if it needed more weight this would leave room to add more lead shot.

When trimming it the Mach 10 seemed to glide better than I had expected from the instructions and other peoples stories. Hand launching it from shoulder height I got 20 to 30 feet of glide.

Flying it on Saturday was a real blast. It flew much straighter than I had heard or remembered. It seemed to boost straight up with no arcing over. It glided very fast, of course, and isn't in any sense a competition boost glider, but it flew extremely well and was a real crowd pleaser.

One thing I need to figure out is a way to make it circle. I think it flies a bit too straight and could easily get lost. In fact I nearly lost it this Saturday. The first flight landed on the feild not far from the pads. The second flight went much further away. I thought it flew over a hedge of bushes on the edge of the field, but it actually must have hit those bushes and fell into the long grass at their base.

This is definitely a fun rocket and one I hope to enjoy flying for many years. I'm planning on building an upscale version that will use

24 mm motors as well.

Jonathan

----- Jonathan Sivier Secretary, Central Illinois Aerospace jsivier AT uiuc.edu NAR #56437 Tripoli #1906 CIA Web Site:

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"Is that a rocket in your pocket or are you just happy to see me?"

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Jonathan Sivier
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I fair while ago I'd built a downscale of the Mach-10, using BT-5 as the motor tube, BT-50 as the body, and a 1/4" launch lug and custom-turned nosed cones for the belly pod. It's a real cute little thing, but I hadn't been able to get it to glide well. Compared to the original Mach-10, it's a real featherweight, which might be a big part of the problem. I'll keep working on it, though.

I wonder if anyone has tried a MicroMaxx version...

Dwayne Surdu-Miller President, Saskatoon Rocketry Society SAROS #001

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Dwayne Surdu-Miller

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