Hello all -

I infrequently post here when I have news from the independent/experimental/amateur rocketry world.

Lots of interesting things have been happening lately. Foremost, all launches have been canceled by the FAA for the foreseeable future. I understand this is for the general safety and mental well-being of the general US population, but it is putting a serious restraint in further development. Hopefully it won't last long. If it does, amateurs will have to change focus to issues that have not been previously addressed, such as telemetry and control systems. This may be the silver lining in this particular black cloud.

JPAerospace attempted a couple of space shot early this year, reaching a maximum altitude in excess of 72,223 ft, verified by GPS. The FAA postponed Ky "Rocketman" Michaelson's space launch. No firm word when he will be allowed to launch, possibly November.

Another "Open Source" distributed development amateur rocketry project is in the works, the basic design is complete, machine work is being sourced.

I've been busy at the static test site, several solid fuel motors and liquid oxygen hybrids as well. These are other people's motors, I've been to busy to do much development myself, but have several solid and hybrid designs slowly moving forward.

One of the most exciting projects is that by Armadillo Aerospace. They have been working on a full RCS/control systems, developing an inexpensive "Lunar Lander" flying on hydrogen peroxide as a monoprop. They are now progressing on a manned version, which will fly a person before the end of the year. It's already flying around the parking lot with a full weight dummy load aboard.

Sugar propellant is gathering significant momentum, with many new processes and researchers getting into it's development. This propellant was first developed in the '40's and featured in the movie "October Sky" based on the "Rocket Boys" book. Despite it's relatively low performance, it is about an order of magnitude cheaper than the common solid propellants, making up for the performance hit. There may also be ways to inexpensively boost it's performance.

Untill next time,

Ad Astra per ardura,

Ray Calkins

http://www.arocket.net