Europe's Biggest Amateur Rocket Completes Test-Firing

Michael Eriksen writes "The Danish amateur rocket group Copenhagen Suborbitals has successfully test fired their rocket (article in Danish). It is a 90,000 kW monster delivering a total of 140,000 N. According to the group, this is by far the biggest amateur rocket ever fired in Europe. The final goal is a manned (!) low-orbital flight."

Comments

Re:Top Gear's Reliant Robin rocket?

[mattaw]

Well the word "rocket" is both an engine and a vehicle in common English usage scenarios. Hence it could be completely accurate to say that it is the largest rocket (i.e. engine, source of thrust) while it isn't the largest rocket (vehicle, reliant robin).

M

Re:Exhaust nozzle blows off after a 2:02

[kobotronic]

Actually, no. The nozzle ring sits on for 10+ seconds.
At 00:34 in the video you can see it fly off, the distinct luminous object leaving the rocket, which ignites at 00:19. I'm no booster specialist (I work video and telemetry), but my understanding is that the booster team is satisfied that at the time of nozzle failure the expansion effect (produced or supported by the nozzle) is no longer required. In any case a thicker nozzle wall has already been drafted for the next test.

The high speed (1200fps) footage closeup (side view) is edited timewise; the whole thing takes about an hour to play back at 30fps. We'll be releasing a video with time codes and more data later this week.

Re:I was there

[andrew.w.moore]

No detraction from their achievements but far from perfect:

Any comments on the nozzle burning through; it can be seen clearly at 1:05-6 http://www.vimeo.com/3531197 flying off "vertically"; look carefully and the nozzle is heating up then "ping" - once the nozzle cone has gone then the burn starts to go turbulent.

This is also very clear in the high-speed footage of this event from the www.copenhagensuborbitals.com site.

Also the engine shutdown seems very messy - lots of random bits'n'pieces thrown about (e.g. down through the flame) - looks like the top of the inside of the booster section sucked down through the ignition chamber.

Well this stuff will be fixed I am sure and congratulations to them.

Re:And so what...

[byrskov]

While it may not have been on purpose (and probably doesn't really qualify for a proper "nuking"), the United States Airforce have in fact dropped four nukes on Denmark, just 41 years ago.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1968_Thule_Air_Base_B-52_crash

To quote the article: "The conventional high explosive components of four B28FI model hydrogen bombs detonated on impact, spreading radioactive material over a large area in a similar manner to a dirty bomb, although a nuclear explosion was not triggered. The extreme heat generated as 225,000 pounds of unused aviation fuel burned for the next 5 to 6 hours melted the ice sheet, causing some wreckage and munitions to sink to the ocean floor".

And to make matters even more interesting, only wreckage from three of the four bombs were found.

700 Danish and American people worked on the cleanup project for 9 months, often without adequate protection. A lot of the locals and cleanup crew have subsequently gone to court over alleged radiation poisoning. Oh, and did I mention that the nukes stored on Greenland was a breach of Denmark's nuclear free zone policy, and were stored there without permission?

It's all fun and games when you're the big guy.