The Vector Force: The Vector Force is a modern Estes kit. This was my first model I made as a BAR. It had very good quality balsa fins on my kit, thick and sturdy. You can see the design is inspired by air defense missiles. It is rather tall, but somewhat heavy because of the two reducers. Because it has two reducer stages it has two separate payload tubes. Estes tells you to glue the payload tubes, but why? Good idea if you want to be sure the rocket doesn't separate in flight, but why waste two very nice payload bays? I just make sure they are always good and tight with some masking tape. Mine is painted school-bus yellow and gloss black to better match the included decals. I added about 3 heavy coats of clear coat for a really deep shine. String stability tests with a C motor required about 20-ish grams of nose weight, but now it flies really straight up - provided there is little wind. The top payload tube has vent holes for a barometric altimeter. I've recorded flights in excess of 400 feet with C6 motors. This is my current go-to flagship rocket. I have tried some test flights with composite D engines, to see if I could kick this puppy past 1000 feet. It sure did! In the process, the shock cord was torn out from the mount. This model was repaired by installing a custom ejection baffle with a Kevlar shock cord attachment. Now I think she'll hold up to a few more D-powered launches and ejections. This rocket has flown higher than the NY Times Building in NY, and also the Chrysler Building including the pinnacle, and the Bank of America Plaza in Atlanta.
| Flight Date: | 2014-03-09 |
| Rocket Name: | Vector Force |
| Kit Name: | Estes - Vector Force {Kit} (003210) |
| Flyer's Name: | Rich DeAngelis |
| Motors: | B6-2 |
| Expected Altitude: | 105 Feet |
| Wind Speed: | 10.00 mph |
| Launch Site: | Penn Manor School Lancaster PA |
| Actual Altitude: | 118 Feet |
This was my first flight of the year, after a long autumn and winter with not a single flight because of the weather. Today was just tolerable, a bit windy but sunny and clear. The fields were still mostly snow covered and soaked from an overnight rain, with snow, slush, puddles and mud.
This was a re-do flight with the B6 motor, a test flight after reducing the nose weight. The last flight had an altimeter trigger error.
She lit right up and streaked skyward. Despite the wind the flight remained fairly straight. It accelerated off the pad at 7.4 Gs, and averaged 2.1Gs for the 9/10 second burn. It reached a top speed of 42 mph and almost coasted to a stop. The early 1.6 sec. ejection fired at 110 feet and the Vector coasted for another 2/10 second to an apogee of 118 feet.
The 12” nylon chute opened clean, and the rocket returned at 9 mph, landing in 10.1 seconds. It was only about 150 feet downwind, but found a lot of wet snow upon landing.
| Stage | Motor(s) |
|---|---|
| 1 | Quest B6-2 |
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