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Danish Amateur Rocket Test Was a Success

Posted by Soulskill on from the congratulations-to-all dept.

Svippy writes "At 16:32 CEST, the amateur-built Danish rocket 'Tycho Brahe' successfully made it up and down again (Danish link)." Here's an English translation via Google Translate. The article includes a video of the launch, which is a mix of Danish media coverage and English launch chatter.

39 comments

  1. Re:first post by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Troll

    Get out.

  2. Come on... by jarich · · Score: 1

    It's not like it's rocket science or anything.... ;)

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    1. Re:Come on... by ArsonSmith · · Score: 1

      Doughnuts in space!!

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    2. Re:Come on... by History's+Coming+To · · Score: 1

      I heard it had a false nose-cone? And a spare made of gold for special occasions?

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    3. Re:Come on... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Well, it would have been good if the summary said something to the effect of, "they're trying to get to manned spaceflight". Some amateur launches a rocket? Not news. A milestone towards an amazing goal? News.

    4. Re:Come on... by FredFredrickson · · Score: 1

      Not exactly rocket science.. heh, this is worth a watch: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WB_axXn8ot8

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    5. Re:Come on... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I understand your joke, if that makes you feel less alone.

  3. Excellent by NEDHead · · Score: 1

    chute work

    1. Re:Excellent by LifesABeach · · Score: 1

      I think the design, not the packing is to blame. Maybe someone with 'chute experience could give'em some pointers. God speed Am-Rock.

  4. Show some support! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    At least link the guys that made it happen.

  5. not bad by v1 · · Score: 2

    liftoff went well, tho it was a bit wobbly there early on but at least it didn't flip over or sink back down like some of those entertaining V2 and other rocket test movies on youtube.

    The parachute failed to deploy properly, so hard to say what they will have for recovery, and hard to say if they have some flotation devices, but I assume so.

    But well done all the same. A lot better than pretty much everyone else has done on their first rocket test.

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    1. Re:not bad by amorsen · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Apparently the parachute problem happened because the launch was aborted. This made the parachute deploy at high speed, rather than at top of the trajectory where speed is low. It is ok to lose the parachute for the booster this way, but obviously they need to solve the problem for the crew module. Controlled abort is one of the great things about their current rocket, and it would be a bit counterproductive if an abort ended in impact after a few km of freefall.

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    2. Re:not bad by sconeu · · Score: 1

      and hard to say if they have some flotation devices

      If they had used Bender instead of a dummy, they could have used his ass as a flotation device!

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    3. Re:not bad by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      A lot better than pretty much everyone else has done on their first rocket test.

      Actually this is their second test. The first attempt last year never went anywhere due to a frozen valve for the oxygen supply. You'll find a lot of sources claiming that was due to a malfunctioning hair dryer. Those claims are inaccurate on two accounts. The hair dryer was not malfunctioning at all, it was however left without power for much longer than anticipated before launch. Second it wasn't even there to heat the valve, rather it was there to heat the actuator that would drive the valve. The valve itself was supposed to keep working at those low temperatures. The reason it froze was that there had been some small amounts of water and oil in the valve. That shouldn't have been there and caused it to freeze.

      The launch this year had a minor glitch. On their first attempt the radio signal to start the autosequencer wasn't picked up. So their mission control were counting down, but in reality the rocket had not been activated yet. A couple of minutes later they tried again and launched.

      The success of this test flight should be measured according to the following metrics:

      • The number of people injured.
      • The ability to actually stay within the area they had for the test
      • The amount of useful data collected to help design the next generation.
      • Proving that they have overcome the problem from last year by actually launching.

      On all of those metrics it was a success. That the engine ended up at the bottom of the sea was unfortunate, but nevertheless doesn't mean it wasn't a success. I guess next year the success criteria may be to launch and have the parachutes deployed at subsonic speed.

    4. Re:not bad by im_thatoneguy · · Score: 1

      Have you been able to find what altitude they reached?

      I can't seem to find that information anywhere.

    5. Re:not bad by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      "...on their first rocket test."

      Except this was not the first test, the first test was back in late 2010: the engine didn't start due to a frozen LOX valve which did not open. They have redesigned the valve heater now.

    6. Re:not bad by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I heard 10,000 ft.

    7. Re:not bad by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      They reached 2.8km according to this article (in Danish).

    8. Re:not bad by im_thatoneguy · · Score: 1

      They reached 2.8km according to this article [ing.dk] (in Danish).

      So... 2.8% of the way there. Does that mean they need to build a rocket 50x bigger? I was really excited about the idea of a minimalist rocket shuttle with the sole intent of getting someone up to 100+ km

      But it's not terribly encouraging when the current design can't even reach a Cessna.

  6. Success? In going up sure... by jpapon · · Score: 1

    I don't speak Danish, but it looks to me like their parachute system did not deploy properly. Unless, that is, the rocket was SUPPOSED to plummet back to earth with a shredded ball of silk dangling above it.

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    1. Re:Success? In going up sure... by KublaKhan1797 · · Score: 4, Informative

      They manually aborted the burn after 21 seconds because the trajectory wasn't stable and they wouldn't risk it leaving the range. The parachutes were then deployed while the rocket was still supersonic something they were never designed for and shredded. However, the unstable trajectory was more less expected as the HEAT 1x has no active stabilization. Next years version should have active stabilization, though. Still, a quite successful launch attempt I think, especially considering the pricetag of a mere $60K!

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    2. Re:Success? In going up sure... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      So success is now defined as 'it didn't blow up'? I mean, they aborted the burn because of instability and the parachute deployed incorrectly. You keep using this word 'success'. I do not think it means what you think it means.

    3. Re:Success? In going up sure... by Soft+Cosmic+Rusk · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I don't think you know what "exceeding the goal" means. This wasn't expected to be a perfect, smooth flight with a soft landing - it was the very first flight of an incomplete version of an all new design, and the succes criterium was simply "getting liftoff". And by that standard, it was a huge success!

    4. Re:Success? In going up sure... by Jarik+C-Bol · · Score: 3, Informative

      when the defined goal for the launch is something along the lines of "Get it off the ground without it exploding" then yes. "it didn't blow up" is a resounding success. the fact the abort worked, and the parachute deployed at all all can be considered resounding bonus success in this case.

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    5. Re:Success? In going up sure... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The key word in the title being Test ;-)

  7. Youtube video link by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Video from the launch.
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GmGmymAWI4E

    (Danish commentary, but english "on air" sound).

    I love the sound of booster rockets :)

  8. Great effort! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    For an amateur effort, this was great! You learn from your failures, and I'm sure they will have better success with their next launch. My best wishes to them! :-) In any case, they still made it to 10 miles altitude before it was aborted.

    -Rubberman

  9. Was it cheese? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Because I fucking LOVE cheese danish!

  10. Wow by byteherder · · Score: 1

    Rocket flies up AND comes down. News at 11.

    1. Re:Wow by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

      I never understood why people with your mindset would ever read a site like slashdot.

    2. Re:Wow by sconeu · · Score: 2

      Vonce rockets go up, who cares vhere zey come down?
      Zat's not my department! Says Werner von Braun.

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  11. Thank God by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Thank God it made it back down again. I'm sure there was a lot of fear on the team they would accidentally exceed escape velocity without realizing it.

    1. Re:Thank God by Gordonjcp · · Score: 1

      Well, aviation is the only field of human endeavour where we've had a 100% success rate - we've never left anyone stuck up there yet!

  12. Awesome by gatkinso · · Score: 1

    That was really cool!

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  13. Damnit... by SomePgmr · · Score: 1

    This story isn't interesting because someone launched a larger-than-usual amateur rocket that had to abort.

    The story is that this is a volunteer, part-time team working towards manned flight, and are accomplishing some impressive things along the way on a teeny budget. I'd think something about that should've been in the summary, no? Or am I the only one that didn't recognize the project offhand?

  14. The passenger by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Isn't the launch a little too agressive for the passenger? Quite some acceleration..