1 Amateur Rocket Crashes, Another Explodes

prostoalex writes "A 23-foot-long space rocket carrying 3 dummies exploded in the Pacific Northwest after reaching about 200 feet. The team was competing for Ansari X Prize, offering $10 million to the team that successfully completes a low-budget private space rocket capable of carrying men into space. Google News offers more perspectives into the event, the team is saying the rocket, whose parachute malfunctioned, would have to be rebuilt." And AmiNTT writes "Everygeek's favorite rocketeers over at Armadillo Aerospace have suffered a fairly serious setback over the weekend - the crash of their 48-inch vehicle link in a test hop at their 100 acre test field. Of course there is video and pictures - 2 3... This setback should keep them from flying for about five weeks, but will give them a chance to make some design changes. I'm sure they will be back better than ever. (Armadillo have shown up on Slashdot many times in the past.)"

Comments

"The Right Stuff", part 2?

[oostevo]

Did anybody else look at that video and immediately remember the montage sequence from The Right Stuff with archival footage of NASA's rockets blowing up?

That didn't set them back, and somehow I don't think this will set back these private experimenters either.

This is sloppy work

[Ge10]

Rocket science is not easy, but almost all of Armadillo's mishaps were due to easily forseeable problems, such as:

*battery connectors coming off
*no protection against inductive kickback(essential around any combination of electromechanical and electronic devices)
*not restricting allowable user inputs (ie joystick)
*underrated power transistors for drive unit (this is very basic stuff)
*finally, not setting minimum fuel level for takeoff

When you are dealing with a field as complex as this, you can't afford to make such stupid mistakes.