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Rocket Hobbyists Prevail Over Feds In Court Case
Ellis D. Tripp writes "DC District Court judge Reggie Walton has finally ruled in the 9-year old court case pitting the model rocketry community against the US Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. The ruling is a 'slam dunk' for the rocketry community, stating that the BATFE ignored scientific evidence and overstepped its bounds by classifying ammonium perchlorate composite propellant (APCP) as an 'explosive.' Effective immediately, the BATFE has no legal jurisdiction over hobby rocket motors, and a federal Low Explosives User's Permit will no longer be needed in order to purchase APCP motors. The full text of the Judge's decision is reproduced at the link."
This next season of Mythbusters is gonna be AWESOME!!
Now that I think about it, I'm pretty sure everything I just said is completely wrong.
For most of my adult life it felt like we were constantly taking steps backward. It's nice to see freedom win over "safety," for a change. May this be the first of many rulings that empower people and encourage the academic spirit.
A government is a body of people notably ungoverned - AC
The ATF announced that they are going to refocus on conducting raids on wacky religious leader's compounds... Because they are much better at doing that.
Let the toy soldiers wear their camouflage underwear and play with their guns. Those of us in the know see the key in chemistry, physics, and the willingness to build a gadget that will solve the problem. For better or worse.
"She's a scientist and a lesbian. She's not going to let it slide." Orphan Black
I can't believe this was ever actually up for debate.
Seriously.... model rocket engines..... ya know lets just ban shoes since they could be used for terrorist acts.
You can't take the sky from me.
How about we just realize that life is dangerous and grow the fuck up.
Otherwise we should ban cars, liquor, cigarettes, saturated fat, and the jonas brothers... cause these have caused far more strife, suffering, and death, than the terrorists could ever hope for.
The BATFE is the most redundant element of the US government. The FBI covers the B, the F and the E. The FDA covers the A and the T. What's left?
We still need an explosives license for APCP here, and it is a lot harder for us. FFS, even the largest estes black powder motors can't be sold because they aren't CE approved
If we can put a man on the moon, why can't we shoot people for Apollo-related non-sequiturs?
But those things have far more uses than just destructive activities. Not much use for rocket engines than to deliver a malignant payload. Do amateur rocketeers really need more powerful rockets to shoot into the sky just for kicks? Do they do anything close to scientific research, or is it just "haha lookit my rockit go!"?
While APCP is the best choice, common table sugar and potassium nitrate makes a decent propellant as well in a pinch.
If absolutely necessary, potassium nitrate can be had by peeing into straw bales and letting it ferment for a while. Even the ATF isn't stupid enough to try to ban peeing without a license.
APCP is used in rocketry primarily because it is a decent propellant that is safe to ship, store, and use with simple precautions. Plenty of other propellant options are available as well without a license but are considerably more dangerous to handle. I doubt that would stop a terrorist, but it does significantly deter harmless rocket hobbyists trying to get their kids interested in science.
If you still think solid rocket propellant without a license is a problem, you will also want household ammonia and/or bleach and pool chlorine banned. I'm guessing that banning gasoline and diesel is right out of the question, but combined with an oxidizer, they have plenty of power.
Considering that hobbyists have jet propelled r/c planes and helos available these days, the terrorist angle might be a hard sell to the courts.
When has regulating anything done anything to stop potential terrorist or other criminal activity? Almost never. When has regulating made it an absolute pain to do something? Always.
We should not regulate or ban things just because they have potential destructive uses. Heck, even if someone just wants to see a rocket shoot up into the air very fast, let them. Most useful scientific research doesn't happen from lab technicians in sterile environments doing everything exactly to the scientific method, it comes from people who just wonder "What if....".
Taxation is legalized theft, no more, no less.
You realize you can buy black powder, by the pound, in cash, with no identification, right?
Yes, I am a smart ass; it's better than the alternative.
Man, what a great day. It reminds me of the quote by Margaret Meade: "Never doubt that a small group of people can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has." The more important issue is that a Federal Judge just told a government agency that they were no longer allowed to impede on the rights and freedoms of private citizens "just because." So while it's a tremendous day for rocketry, it's also a great day for the American People at large.
My girlfriend (cue +5 Funny reply) told me about her home state of Virginia moving the fences along the freeways back to 50 feet, because they were concerned about kids climbing over them on a dare. Since they didn't figure they could stop this behavior, they decided to make it safe ("over the fence" is no longer a traffic zone).
Then and now, I don't see why they have fences in the first place. Without fences, a kid will die... and then everyone will know the story about the kid who died, and the idiocy will be stopped cold for at least five years (i.e. one high school rotation).
With fences in place, in the public eye it's the fault of the fence-builders for building insecure fences, not the kid for winning a Darwin. It's an outrage, not a lesson. And due to a false sense of safety, people get just as hurt just as often.
Why in the world is "haha lookit my rockit go!" not a valid purpose? I would wager that for many a future engineer, physicist, astronomer, etc model rocketry is what set the hook of their interest in their future profession. I guess if we want everyone to be writers (and not that there's anything wrong with that, I'm one) we don't need to encourage private experimentation and exploration and the sciences. But if we ever aspire to be more than that, we sure better encourage more kids to "haha lookit my rockit go!"
In addition to not being a trivial exercise, the Feds tend to view building a guidance system as going beyond model rocketry to building a guided a missile, which they frown on. You might be able to get away with very small ones, but I don't really have a good feel for what the minimum weight you could get for servos, control computer and sensors would be, and what size rocket that would indicate.
We build ~150-lbf thrust hybrid rockets for our senior design projects, and in the past few years its become more and more difficult to do anything interesting because of increased restrictions, from the school administration, the FAA, and Department of Homeland Security. Having a launch site that was pretty near Crawford, TX also made things difficult, had to find a new launch site.
How hard would it be to synthesize ammonium perchlorate from APCP?
Pretty difficult. APCP consists of AP and a powdered metal (Al or Mg) locked in a matrix of synthetic rubber. The material has about the consistency of a pencil eraser. Anything that would dissolve away the rubber binder would most likely react with the AP.
Besides, AP itself was not regulated by the BATFE, except for a VERY finely granulated (If it is not overly difficult, the BATF has every reason to be worried that mass distribution of this without licensing could open a channel for acquiring explosives materials domestically and in bulk under the guise of "hobbyist".
First of all, this whole court decision was based on the fact that APCP is NOT an explosive. Even contained in a sealed metal pipe, it is pretty worthless for building a bomb. And second, these motors will not exactly be "mass distribution" type items you will find on the shelves at Walmart or whatever. Purchase will STILL require certification through one of the 2 national rocketry organizations (NAR or Tripoli), HAZMAT shipping (which can only go to a valid address, not a PO box) and legally using them still requires airspace waivers from the FAA.
It wouldn't be the first time -- pseudoephedrine can be readily broken down to ephedrine, which is one of the components needed for methanphetamine production (and derivatives).
Which makes for a major PITA for law-abiding citizens who now have to get the 3rd degree from a pharmacist to get a pack of allergy pills. Meanwhile, the meth keeps pouring in from the "superlabs" south of the border. At least we're all safe from those evil packages of Sudafed, though!
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Even the ATF isn't stupid enough to try to ban peeing without a license.
Don't be too sure about that... Never underestimate the stupidity of a government agency.
Fascism starts when the efficiency of the government becomes more important than the rights of the people.
Extracting ammonium perchlorate from APCP wouldn't be too difficult--the AP is basically just mixed in with a bunch of other compounds that control the rate of deflageration.
However, I think you're missing the point here. APCP is not an explosive. That is the issue. The BATFE does not control chemicals that can be used to make explosives. In fact, binary explosives, ammonium nitrate, and black powder in quantities of less than 50 pounds are all supposed to be out of their jurisdiction. Why then, should they be investigating a mixture that doesn't even detonate?
Actually, yes we do something "close to scientific research." The rocketry club I am with launches a large rocket every year which carries experiments devised by middle and high school students. They've done everything from testing the durability of common electronic devices to studying the effects of acceleration on non-Newtonian fluids.
Mentos and Pepsi.
-Sean
Most useful scientific research doesn't happen from lab technicians in sterile environments doing everything exactly to the scientific method, it comes from people who just wonder "What if....".
It's also how most Darwin Awards happen.
HBI's Law: Frequency of calling others Nazis is directly correlated with the likelihood of the accuser being Communist.
It wouldn't be the first time -- pseudoephedrine can be readily broken down to ephedrine, which is one of the components needed for methanphetamine production (and derivatives).
Which makes for a major PITA for law-abiding citizens who now have to get the 3rd degree from a pharmacist to get a pack of allergy pills. Meanwhile, the meth keeps pouring in from the "superlabs" south of the border. At least we're all safe from those evil packages of Sudafed, though!
Exactly, Ellis. It doesn't stop a small group of people going to every pharmacy in the area to buy one box of Sudafed at each so they can use them in their meth lab.
I dunno, do we really need to allow you to drive beyond the city limits? I mean, if freedoms are defined as "what you really need to get along", why I bet I could deprive you of pretty much all your freedoms.
Freedom means having to put up with things that may be inherently dangerous. There's an old saying by a guy named Benjamin Franklin about that, but then again, since I'm thinking of removing your freedom to use the Internet or look at books, I don't suppose you'll ever know about it.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
APCP sales just skyrocketed!
I have something in common with Stephen Hawking...
In the figurative sense certainly, by hiring an 'expert' to do their testing who knew nothing about the field, produced results that were nonsensical and pretty much conducted scientific fraud at the behest of ATFE. Proper expert testimony was provided by rocket motor manufacturers who had worked in the field for the government and/or contractors, still consulted to the government, and worked on other projects like SpaceShip 1. Why ATFE didn't see this coming is a mystery.
They also nearly blew themselves up literally. They 'required' one of the motor manufacturers to sell them motors at market price (he had initially declined). They rented a van, loaded up their rockets and headed to the desert to do some testing. They intended to prove that high powered rockets could be used to bring down an aircraft. They ignored the rules that virtually all rocketers follow regarding distance between launcher and people, rockets and motors. They launched one out of the back of the van. The back blast lit their other motors in the van. Their rented van proceeded to burn merrily to the ground. They denied it, but it was proven otherwise. They started to try to get a gag order but apparently used their one and only Blinding Glimpse of the Obvious on this rather than one the case as a whole.
As for other regulation, high powered rocketry has been well regulated all along, just as its little cousin, model rocketry, is. The rules originated with G. Harry Stine, one time range safety officer at White Sands and pioneer of model rocketry. The high powered rules evolved over time, and have been considered acceptable in development and content by the FAA, the National Fire Protection Association, and similar relevant agencies. We have been trusted for 50 years to develop and follow our own regulations suitable to these agencies. Now we can ignore the arbitrary, stifling, baseless rules concocted by ATFE (put into force without due process) and carry on another 50 years. The regulations we have in place cover all airframes and power systems up through 200,000 newtons, where the FAA's office of space transportation takes over.
The standing regulations for high powered rocketry are available the National Association of Rocketry at http://nar.org/hpcert/NARhprintro.html Only high powered motors were involved in the ruling. Model rockets (including "large model rockets", up to 3.3 pounds loaded and 4 ounces of propellant) were not involved.
As for APCP, although it produces a large amount of exhaust gas which can be channeled through a nozzle to produce thrust (see the space shuttle's boosters for an example), it burns at about the rate of a piece of paper. Thus while it might "conflagerate" it is hardly worth bothering with as an explosive. It is actually more profitable to use small model rocket motors for explosives as they are black powder.
NAR #28965, High Power Certification level 1
Rocketeer since June 1964
"I may be synthetic, but I'm not stupid." -- Bishop 341-B
You can buy binary explosives off the internet in 50 pound lots. You just have to mix it at the point of use on private property and not store it over 24 hours.
Google for boomer shoots and tannerite. Look at the National Firearms Act of 1934 for the definition of what fun stuff is legal with the right tax payment.
This is simply not true.
First, the FAA (Office of Commercial Spaceflight, or AST) regulates rocketry unless it's intended to be a weapon. I.e., don't load it with explosives or flash powder, or fire it horizontally from a tube, and it's fine.
Second, guided rockets are fairly ok now.
The old FAA regulations for rockets treated guided rockets as needing permits or waivers for flights. Now, if you're under certain altitude thresholds and far enough from an airport, it's fine - hovering flight under guidance out on a ranch for example just requires calling the nearest airport and notifying them.
A flight out of one of the (few) unregulated airspace locations in the US (Black Rock desert, for example) to any altitude, with a rocket with less than 200,000 pound thrust-seconds of impulse (up to about a thousand pounds of propellant, give or take some performance normalizing) also requires no permitting or waiver, other than notifying the nearest airport a day ahead of time.
Larger rockets, or rockets flown near airports, or not far from innocent bystanders, are subject to increasing scrutiny for safety (of the general public and overflying aircraft).
Even if you do reach the size or performance that requires a waiver or permit, doing the paperwork is being found by experience to be less burdensome than doing a decent job of designing the rocket and testing it. It just isn't the hardest part of it. If you're spending six months to a year building it, what's a month or two's part time effort on the paperwork?
If you're in that performance regime and flying near where you could conceivably kill someone, the FAA will quite reasonably give you plenty of free advice on how not to do that, as will plenty of other amateur and semi-professional and professional rocketry people... John Carmack's Armadillo Aerospace has helped other companies and groups out a lot with advice and moral support, and he's far from the only one.
"A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the People to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed."
The right is "to keep and bear arms", that first part is a justification. The sensible interpretation of the first part is that it's one example to justify the right. Anyone who thinks clearly will realise that it wasn't the only justification at the time, but it sure sounds important compared to shooting dinner or robbers and such.
Today we set to find out, whether we can really build a Quassam rocket [wikipedia.org] on a budget.
I hope they are building them on a budget. 1700+ launches for 28 dead Israeli's doesn't seem like a good ROI to me ;)
if we can successfully hit police station with it.
Why am I picturing Adam Savage saying something like "Alright, the way I figure it, we've got a 10% chance of hitting the police station, a 50% chance of it blowing up on the launchpad and a 40% chance of getting arrested! Let's do this thing!"
I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.
Most useful scientific research doesn't happen from lab technicians in sterile environments doing everything exactly to the scientific method, it comes from people who just wonder "What if....".
It's also how most Darwin Awards happen.
Also a worthwhile human endeavor.
'Sensible' is a curse word.
You can also buy ammonium nitrate and diesel, by the truckload. Black powder is for pikers.
Field and Stream, the hunting and fishing magazine, once published an article showing how to build duck ponds to support duck populations. There, in black and white and color, in the library of my junior freaking high, was an article teaching you how to build bombs. It was great.
I was taught to respect my elders. The trouble is, it's getting harder and harder to find some.
Nope, it doesn't. The Israelis do far better... in fact the kill ratio is 100-to-1 in their favor. During the Gaza adventure, IDF killed 1,434 Palestinians, while 13 Israelis were killed (3 by rockets fired.) 5,303 Palestinians injured.
No wonder the Americans invest in Israel, they're the winning horse...
O lord, bless this thy holy hand grenade, that with it thou mayest blow thine enemies to tiny bits, in thy mercy.
How hard would it be to synthesize ammonium perchlorate from APCP?
Makes about as much sense as buying 4 cases of soda because you need 2 cups of sugar for a recipe.
All kinds of chemicals you can make explosives out of are mostly unregulated, why goof around trying separate AP out of commercial rocket propellent.
Good luck with hitting anything with an unguided rocket,
We'll make up for that by doing volume!
http://marriedmansexlife.com/
"The anti-social behaviour of people wanting to be able to 'defend themselves', at great cost to society at large, is despicable."
That statement is simply breathtaking.
"As God is my witness, I thought turkeys could fly." A. Carlson
The National Association of Rocketry argued that ammonium percholorate is not an explosive (it is in fact an oxidizer) and appended massive amounts of technical information to show that it is not.
The BATF replied "we don't give a damn about the facts, we will regulate it and you can't stop us."
And, after nine years, the judge ruled that the facts actually are relevant, and the BATF is allowed to regulate only the things that they are legally allowed to regulate.
Congratulations, NAR.
http://www.geoffreylandis.com
Go look at the Interwebs and see the Bomb Shelter BUS STOPS they have in areas bordering Gaza and the West Bank. It's not just the rockets, its the fact that Isralis are living in a land where when they hear the rocket warning alarms, they have mere seconds to be inside the nearest bomb shelter. These people are as trained in what to do when a rocket is incoming as members of the US Military and they have daily "drills".