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NSTAR 03-A Flight Summary
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Photo from NSTAR 03-A capsule at about 2200 ft MSL (700 ft AGL).
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NSTAR 03-A - 15 March 2003 - 0846 CST (1446 UTC)
I guess it could have been worse........
Most of the crew arrived by 7:45am. We learned the evening before that ES-OS would not be flying today, so no EBBE experiment to Colorado. After we get our equipment unloaded I call Don KA0JLF to see how HABITAT is doing. He is still enroute to his launch site, but won't be too far behind us.
The winds have been fairly steady about 10 knots - enough to make us have to be more careful, but not too bad to this point. We hook up our 1200g balloon and start filling. After putting in about 15% of the T-tank, one of the crew notices a hole in the balloon as part of the inspection we do. The hole is about the size of a nickel. We stop filling and unhook the balloon and vent it out. I'm going to call the manufacturer to see if I can return this one.
One of our launch crew this morning is Rich from the Nebraska Balloon Club. His group flies hot-air balloons. He commented after we arrived that we were wasting our "boundary layer", the quieter air early in the morning near the surface. The winds about a thousand feet above us are over 50 knots, and they'll make their presence felt soon.
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NSTAR 03-A Flight Summary
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Photo from NSTAR 03-A capsule at about 2200 ft MSL (700 ft AGL).
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We start filling our spare balloon (600g). Fortunately we detected the hole in the first one before we wasted too much helium - there was enough remaining in the first tank that there was no need to open the second. We did notice that this balloon appeared lopsided with one side very stretched out. We get the second balloon filled, but as we were doing so the winds started to increase some more.
After we get the balloon tied off, we are getting gusts to 15-20 knots. This makes it difficult to handle the balloon and keep it from striking other objects. I'm working on a video clip that will show the fun we had. We get the payloads attached and start moving everything to the release point.
Now the wind is really gusty. The balloon is nearly out of control, and it is difficult to maneuver it into an area where it can't strike a tree or the ground. With more luck than skill, we get it winched out. However, the wind is so strong that everything is tilted over about 45° and the balloon isn't high enough to pick the payloads off the ground - we can barely get the parachute off the ground. This isn't satisfactory for us, as we'll have problems with the payloads striking the ground or becoming tangled. The gusty wind threatens all the time to take our last balloon into a tree.
Just then, one of the lanyards breaks. We still have hold of the balloon, but even less control and we still don't have the balloon high enough to take up the slack on the payload train. I decide that the thing to do now is to release the last lanyard, get tension on the payload train, make any last maneuvers to straighten it out, then release it. The wind is still strong enough to cause the balloon to come close to the ground. I wait for a lull, then let it go.
The payloads just clear the nearby outbuilding and tree line. I run to the car to check on the data - payloads are running fine. We get in our cars and head for US71 and I-80 north of Atlantic to wait for burst.
As we're going, a couple of things start to disturb me. Doug KA0O reports that he is no longer receiving data from the backup beacon on 144.39. Also, I notice that as the payload gets above 30,000 ft I'm decoding fewer and fewer packets. Listening to the audio, I can tell that the payload is still transmitting OK, but only 20% or so are getting decoded. I begin to get a little concerned that we might lose both of them and be unable to track them. The SSTV is still running fine, however.
Burst occurs at 81,072 feet, which is pretty good for a 600g balloon and one as lopsided as we had. Doug and Wayne KE6DZD had missed us stopping at I-80, so we head north to join them near Audubon. As we're heading north, we hear from several other chasers who came from Des Moines and the surrounding area. We begin to decode packets OK again, so the stress is off concerning our tracking ability.
Now the guessing game begins. We knew from the winds at launch that there was a low-level jet centered about 3000 ft MSL with stronger winds than those above it. We set up in a position where we think the balloon will pass overhead, but figure the landing will be too far away from the road to bother with trying a "catch". Suddenly we get an update indicating the balloon is passing about a half-mile to our southeast instead of coming overhead. We see the parachute canopy as the balloon passes behind us.
The landing is in a soybean field about 600 yards from the closest roads. The payload was still transmitting after it hit the ground, so we were reasonable sure it was not seriously damaged. Larry N0BKB heads to the nearest farmhouse to get permission to enter the field, but no one's home. About five of us hop the fence and head into the field. It's a hard slog, as the top few inches of soil are muddy but probably still frozen underneath. A few grassy patches makes it easier.
The payloads appear intact. I check out the backup beacon - it's still powered on and showing a good GPS lock. I'm beginning to suspect the antenna system has a problem somewhere. Only two position reports were captured by FindU.
SSTV was good, though the high-altitude photos were hazy - that was expected. Stations in Des Moines, Bellevue NE, and Independence MO were able to decode pictures, and I had a report of the SSTV signal being audible but not decodeable in St Louis. APRS data was also decoded in St Louis, which was a range of about 330 miles. The onboard Elph film camera again perfomed flawlessly.
Another exciting-for-the-wrong-reasons flight.........
Saturday the 26th dawned clear and calm. Most of us got to the launch site about 7am and we started right in with unloading the equipment and filling the balloon. There was for all practical purposes zero wind, a tremendous improvement from last time.
With a 11 to 12-lb payload, it normally takes a full T-tank of helium (290 cu ft) to get about 1000 ft/min, almost regardless of balloon size (a smaller balloon like a 350g or 600g goes about 1100-1200 ft/min, a larger one like a 1200g maybe about 900). Because our track was towards Creston IA, I wanted to avoid the larger lakes just north of there. Setting a ascent rate goal of 800 ft/min for our Kaymont 600g balloon seemed the best way to get away from them, by going a little longer. By my calculations, we would need 80% of a T-tank, or about 2000 psi (a full tank is about 2600, ours had 2500).
We fill the balloon, draining the tank from 2500 psi to 500 psi and hopefully yielding the # of cubic feet required to get our 800 ft/min. Everything is hooked up to the load line and all the payloads were switched on and transmitting, so we winch the balloon out to take up the payload weight. We notice there is very little free lift with the payloads suspended, so I decide to a weight and lift check prior to release.
The free lift is about 12lb 9oz - the scale is bouncing by +/- 2oz of that figure. I hang the payloads by the spreader ring - 11 lb 10 oz. OK, about a pound of free lift. I realize later I had not fully accounted for the weight of the parachute, but figured it was at least partially offset by the weight of the lanyard strings hanging from the balloon when the free lift was measured (the lanyards are pulled free and do not fly). Anyway, I figure I'm just under a pound of free lift.
If I had much of a choice, I'd have put more helium in the balloon. But, that's difficult or impossible once everything is tied and taped. I figure we have enough, let's go with it.
We winch the balloon out again. The last item before release is to switch on the camcorder, maximizing tape and battery life. I call the countdown and Mike lets the lanyards go.
The balloon rises at a "gentle" ascent rate. It seems slow, especially compared to our usual rocket-like launches. The sun glints off the still camera's face and I curse, realizing I failed to turn it on.
After a minute, the balloon looks like it's nearly stationary, both in the horizontal and in the vertical. Oh, ****. I go over to the car and look at the data. 120 ft/min. ****. 70 ft/min. Double ****. My mind starts racing - at 100 ft/min and 70,000 ft to burst, that's what, 700 minutes isn't it. 700 minutes is, holy crap, nearly 12 hours. My primary beacon is only good for about 8. The backup is normally good for about 16, but we haven't had a good flight from that in a while. The SSTV is maybe good for 5 hours of DFing. My heart sinks. We've never flown a cutdown - haven't seen the need until now. Boy, there's just not much to be done at this point. Kind of like stepping out of an airplane and realizing you don't have your parachute on. I really start kicking myself mentally as I remember we were sub-1lb on free lift. That was stupid, letting a balloon go with so little lift.
The best thing now is to see if we can possibly get people downrange to listen. The max winds aloft were 50 knots so we should be able to stay with it for the most part, but it would be better to have more ears. We get hooked up to the internet and I send an e-mail to the KNSP and APRSSIG lists hoping to get some assistance.
Just after I get the e-mail sent, things begin to brighten a little. The ascent rate is now about 200 ft/min and seems to be increasing. Now we're to about 350 minutes mission duration, or not quite 6 hours. That's within the primary beacon's battery life, but that life is at room temperature. The payload will be spending a lot more time in -50C or colder conditions. While I was sending an e-mail, I downloaded the latest wind forecasts and start running predictions. At 200 ft/min, the predicted landing shows something 30-40 miles east of I-35 and not far south of the Missouri border. Ok, this might be a recoverable error after all.
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NSTAR 03-B Flight Summary
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SSTV images recorded by N0ORU near Anita IA
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We start the chase south and east. No more reports from the backup beacon - must be the antenna after all as everything else has been changed. Primary and SSTV are going with no problem. The internal temperatures are steady or slightly rising - the sun on them must be offsetting the cold air. Even our ascent rate is slowly increasing. We're now going from "slow-motion" disaster to a long but reasonable flight.
After two hours, I expected the tape to run out in the camcorder and power down, leaving the SSTV with no video source. Another pleasant surprise - when the tape runs out in this model, it apparenlty doesn't turn off as I'm still getting pictures.
Burst happens at 70,075 ft. At least we didn't go neutrally buoyant, too. We look to be just a little too far away to get in position to see it come down - had we left the launch site even 10 minutes sooner, we might have. Oh, well, I just want the thing back even if I have to cut a tree to get it. We're about six miles away when the payload lands.
Compared to the launch, the landing was perfect. Once again, in an open field and not too far from the road, about a mile and a half from the town of Grand River, IA. There aren't any houses in sight for over a mile, so we figure we're OK to get in, recover, and leave. The payloads are intact, and we load up for the long trip home.
After I get home, I find that perhaps the biggest surprise of the day is on the camcorder tape. You just have to see it. All four clips are the same content, different formats - pick the one that best suits your bandwidth and players.
Some lessons relearned:
This flight went without a hitch. It's nice to have one of those now and again.
The NSTAR crew began arriving around 7am. There was some extensive mid-level cloud cover at sunrise, but that was pulling away and leaving almost clear skies for us. Temperatures were in the low 60s and just the barest hint of a breeze. We were planning our launch time to coincide with the 2003 Great Plains Super Launch, happening in east-central Colorado that morning. We had prepared for a digipeater experiment between NSTAR and the EOSS balloon, but due to a slow leak in the EOSS balloon, they had to cut their mission short.
We start filling the balloon and do our now-standard check for holes - none this time. This was the replacement 1200g balloon for the one with a hole in it we tried to use for 03-A. We empty the T-tank into the balloon this time, too. All the payloads are working fine and we hook them up to the parachute and load line. Doug KA0O reads off our new NSTAR pre-flight checklist which ensures we don't forget anything like opening the still camera's shutter. The checklist has items like getting a free lift estimate, but the scale won't cooperate with us - no reading at all.
We're ready to go on time, so we release the balloon just before 0747 CDT. Within 30 seconds we know we have a good ascent rate of over 800 ft/min, and within about three minutes it settles into its steady-state ascent rate of around 1000 ft/min.
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NSTAR 03-C shortly before landing
near Carson, IA |
NSTAR 03-C Flight Summary |
The forecasted landing is only 7 miles away, so we decide to hang around the launch site until burst. Scott (KC0MTH, our host) brings out some comfy chairs for us. The primary and backup payloads are banging away flawlessly, and the simplex repeater is operating. Our first more-distant contact is Rob WV0S in Topeka, who volunteers to start logging for us.
The balloon remains within sight for us for better than an hour. Shortly after 9am Wayne KE6DZD remarks "I think the balloon burst - it just faded out". My first thought is "nah, that can't be - it's barely over 80,000 ft and we have about 15 minutes to go". Then the alarm on my computer goes off indicated I've received the "burst" notice from the payload. Our maximum altitude is 81,069 ft which occurred at 0907 CDT (1407 UTC).
| Stations heard on the simplex repeater | ||
| N9XTN | KC0HMI | KU4ZD |
| KA0O | N0BKB | KE6DZD |
| WV0S | K0BWJ | KC0ECI |
| N0ZXJ | AB0VM | NR0A |
| KI0AU | ||
We get in our vehicles and head to the intersection of US 6 and US 59, about 8 miles away. Telemetry indicates a good chute for the payload, and everything is still operating. A while later, the payload passes overhead at about 22,000 ft and I can just see the parachute for 20 seconds or so - then I take my eyes off it and lose it in the sun. We move two miles farther south on US 59 and stop again to debate our next move. The payload is still moving south at about 20-30 mph and is a couple of miles to our east. We decide to head east on a county road for a mile, then south. We end up coming to a T with Hwy 92 when the balloon is still at 5000 ft or so. Since we can't chase any farther south by road, we get out and watch the terminal descent.
We can see a lot of the balloon hanging from the top of the parachute. This is causing a slow rotation of the stack at a rate of once per every 4-6 seconds, then something will shift and it stabilizes for a short time. During the rotation, the stack is pulled about 30-45 degrees off a vertical axis. The stack floats over Hwy 92 at about 1000 ft AGL and lands in a soybean field within our sight south of the road.
Several of us head the relatively short distance into the field to recover the payload. Everything is undamaged and the parachute is normal. About half of our 1200g balloon came back - normally the Kaysams shred more cleanly. After bringing the payloads back to the vehicles, we review the videotape. Because the landing occurred almost exactly two hours after launch (at 14:47:30 UTC) we were hoping to have videotape of the landing, but the tape ran out at 14:46:18, or 1 minute 12 seconds earlier. Prior to launch, we were not expecting to have tape of the landing because the balloon should have burst at about 98,000 ft. With the early burst, we thought we had a chance.
The FindU logs indicated the backup beacon was nearly perfect. We lost several packets during the turbulence after burst, which is not unexpected. FindU also indicated the backup beacon was picked up by the CLRMRE digipeater near Tulsa, a distance of 343.6 statute miles at the time.
Launch and landing video (about 4 min in length)
Windows Media (7 Mbytes)
Real Video (10 Mbytes)
Payload view of launch, burst, and near landing (about 9 minutes)
Windows Media (23 Mbytes)
Excel spreadsheet data (450 kbytes)
After having a near-perfect flight in June, it was time for Murphy to come back again. Fortunately he didn't do much to us.
This flight was two years to the day after our ill-fated 01-E flight that ended in a fried payload. I was hoping we weren't tempting fate too much by scheduling on the same day of the year again. Much of Saturday and Sunday was overcast with light rain, but by Sunday evening it had cleared out enough that Mars was brilliant in the southeastern sky just days after its close approach, promising good weather for Monday's flight.
Wayne drove for me again this time and we arrived at the launch site about 6:30am. Most of our usual crew arrived shortly afterwards. Dr Mike Larson, a professor at UNO, came out to see the launch activities. He had attended the CU workshop and GPSL 2003 in Colorado, and had recently held a teachers' workshop at UNO where they launched balloon-sats with the help of the Iowa State Univ. HABET group.
The morning weather was perfect, with no discernable wind and temps in the mid 50s. We were planning to launch at 0730, but got started a little late. We started filling the Kaysam 1000g balloon with 1 T-tank and the remaing 20% of another about 0725 and were ready to go about 20 minutes later. We got word of a group on their way to the launch site, so we held a few minutes for them. At 07:51:11 CDT, we let the balloon go.
With a relatively short chase ahead, we decided to stay at the launch site for a while. It was clear enough for us to see the balloon easily, at least until it became more in line with the sun. The primary and backup APRS payloads were functioning well, but the simplex repeater was a little ragged at times - it seemed to have trouble hearing.
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NSTAR 03-D Flight Summary |
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| At 70,000 ft looking ESE |
| Aerial Photo Album |
Around 0830 CDT we left the launch site and started on our chase. As we got to Hwy 92 and US71, we saw signs indicating a detour near Griswold, which would slow us up a little. Fortunately, the detour was a short one and we continued east. At 08:53:41, the balloon burst a little lower than expected at 73,934 ft.
We continued east on Hwy 92 and began to position ourselves for the landing, which we now expected to be a few miles south or southeast of Cumberland. We also heard several hams from central Iowa joining us now on the chase. As we were driving along the gravel roads, we had expected to see the payloads under the parachute, but none of us could see them yet.
Finally, as the payloads came below 1500 ft AGL, we could see them. This time, the balloon appeared fouled on the bottom payload, so it wasn't swinging quite as badly as we had observed on previous flights. The payloads were over a section of farmland pretty much devoid of hazards, and the landing occurred at 09:32:20 CDT in some corn.
What was either an abandoned farmstead or just a set of buildings was about 300 yds off the road with a trail leading to it. The payloads had landed about 100 more yards into the corn itself. Doug KA0O, Paul KC0KXR, and I began hiking into the cornfield, using the GPS to guide us to the landing spot. We could only see 10-20 ft around us, so it was no easy task. The GPS itself and the roundoff of the data meant for an error of around 50-75 ft, so there was still a little searching to do even after we arrived at the designated spot. Paul was the first to spot the capsule and we all headed to it, following his voice.
The parachute was in the tops of the corn, but was only barely visible from outside the field (we didn't spot it, but Lowell KB6SDI got to a higher spot and could just see it). The payloads were resting on the ground and were covered in condensation. Otherwise everything looked normal and we carted everything out and back to the waiting crew along the roadside. Most of us then went to Massena, where we stopped at a gas station for some drinks and snacks before heading home.
After I got home, I checked out camcorder. It appears I had not started the tape before release, even though I had powered on the camcorder. Normally I check for the red LED indicating the tape was rolling, but this time I forgot to do it. That will be a new checklist item. The still photos had a problem with condensation on the Elph's lens during descent below 10,000 ft. The film emulsion had some damage to it indicating the moisture made its way inside the film area. That is the first time in six flights with this camera setup - for now, we'll just hope it doesn't happen too often. Heating the camera to drive off the moisture could be more problematic than the moisture itself.
The new EEPROM chips logged 3932 position reports, 2820 of which were while the payload was in flight. The recording interval was every 2 seconds, minus about 3 per minute when the Basic Stamp needed extra time to send data to the TNC serial port. I think this is one of the most detailed flight records available. The chips and associated hardware to do this logging was less than $25.
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Callsigns heard on the simplex repeater |
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WD0BFO |
N9XTN |
KA0O |
N0ORU |
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KE6DZD |
KC0HMI |
K0CTU |
KC0KXR |
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N0BKB |
KI0AU |
KD0FW |
KB0YUP |
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N0TRK |
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| Audio from the simplex repeater (1.3 Mbyte MP3) | |||
We had another beautiful day for a flight. Sunday dawned clear and calm, with just a little bit of fog over the rivers and creeks. There was also some frost here and there on the ground. Most of us arrived at Scott’s a little after 7 and we started filling our Kaysam 1000g balloon about 7:35.
With nearly zero wind, we decided to let it go from our usual fill position. Doug read off the checklist for me and we were just about finished at 7:55. However, the main payload’s packets were not decoding well on my car’s TNC/laptop tracking combination. I cycled the power on the main payload hoping that would clear things – it couldn’t hurt, and would restart the EEPROM log anyway.
We released the balloon just after 1301 UTC. Everything looked normal for the first couple of minutes, so our attention turned to packing up to start the chase. We knew we had little time to spare if we were to be in the vicinity of the payloads as they landed, so we got underway about 7 minutes after the balloon was released.
The first thing we noticed was that the SSTV signal rapidly became too weak to decode. The first couple of pictures were OK, but after that we were lucky to decode even a callsign. Later in the flight, the signal hardly broke squelch. Later I did get a report from near Bethany MO (about 70 mi away) that the signal was decodable using a beam and horizontal polarization – the SSTV whip was oriented horizontally. In the past the cross-polarization has not been a significant problem, but this time it was.
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NSTAR 03-E Flight Summary |
Next was the backup beacon. During the ascent, the altitude became "stuck" around 4400 ft for 3 minutes, then began increasing normally again. Later, at about 24,000 ft, the altitude became "stuck" again, then within 10 minutes the position, speed, and time also stopped updating. The backup beacon did get a 2D lock again about 20 minutes before landing, and got a 3D lock with its last posit before touchdown. The FindU logs showed the transmitter was still beaconing at one-minute intervals pretty much throughout the flight, so that indicated the TinyTrak and the transmitter was still working. After reviewing our previous flights, it seems we have never had acceptable backup beacon performance when flying the SSTV. I believe the SSTV may interfere with the GPS and prevents it from maintaining 3D lock.
We got on US 59 and drove south to US 34, then headed east. Our landing forecast was in the vicinity of Osceola near I-35 and US 34. We maintained a steady pace, but the balloon was outrunning us in the 85-mph jet stream. As the balloon ascended above 55,000 ft, it slowed down to a 25-mph pace and we began to get ahead of it as we went though Afton.
Burst occurred at 81,292 feet and 14:39:05 UTC. Looking at the logs, the Basic Stamp 2p underwent a reset about 1 minute later. Because the GPS appeared to maintain 3D lock and produced valid positions and altitudes within 10-15 seconds of the upset, I believe only the BS2p lost power/reset and not the GPS. I am not sure of the cause of this upset, but will be looking the power connections to the BS2p’s circuit board.
During the descent, we had to follow some Iowa state troopers and behave ourselves for around 10 miles, but soon they turned off and we were able to resume our customary chase speed. We made contact with N0BKB and some of the other Iowa chasers west of Osceola. As we went through Osceola, we began to discuss whether the payload would go south of US34 and how far east of Osceola it would get. We turned north on a gravel road about 8 miles east of town and pulled off to wait a couple of minutes. As the balloon began to turn from it’s southeasterly course to northeast, we drove north another mile and began to look for it.
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NSTAR 03-E shortly before landing |
We were finally able to spot the balloon about 5000 ft MSL and a half-mile west of our position. The balloon was still drifting northeast, so we went a little farther north and turned west. By then it was less than a thousand feet up and coming more or less towards us. I got out of the car to get a clear view with my camera and snapped a few telephoto pictures as it came down in front of us about 200 yards away. Landing occurred at 15:20:00 in a cow pasture about 50 ft from the road.
As the chase team pulled in, a van I didn’t recognize pulled in front of the gate to the pasture. The driver asked if that was our parachute that just landed. I said it was, and he said he was the landowner. He and his family happened to be coming down the road from either the north or east and they saw the parachute come down. He opened the gate for us and we walked in and shut down the payloads. We took a few minutes to explain what we were doing to the children that were along and then carried everything out. I left an NSTAR card so they could look up the web site later on.
Because the Iowa chasers had other plans for the afternoon, they headed back home from the landing site. The Omaha group made their way to the Osceola Pizza Hut (our second visit – we were there last year for Flight 02-F). This landing was about 7 miles due east of 02-F’s landing. After lunch, we started the long drive for home.
The still pictures from the payload were excellent. The launch site was visible in four of the early photos, and, more remarkably, the chase crew could be seen in three of the landing photos. In fact, in the last picture the lone figure in the road is me trying to get a picture of the payloads as they’re coming down.
The videotape was good, but shorter than expected. The first 40 minutes was test footage taken during SSTV testing – I forgot to rewind the tape afterwards. Unfortunately the tape ran out before burst so we couldn’t use that to determine whether it was rougher than usual.
The EEPROM recorded about 1760 records while in flight, including readings from our Honeywell ASDX015A24R barometric sensor. The sensor readings tracked well with altitude, but I have not calculated how well calibrated they are. Because of the payload restart, the records from launch to 37,000 ft were overwritten.
A big thank-you goes out to an anonymous donor who provided for most of the expendable costs for this flight!
Another mixed bag of results - we got everything recovered OK, but some of the payloads didn't work the best.
Due to earlier forecasts of stronger winds aloft, we changed the launch site from near Treynor to my in-laws' west of Omaha. Scott KC0MTH and Kurt KC0HMI began their chase from Scott's QTH, allowing them to get a head start on the flight. The rest of us arrived at my in-laws' around 7:30am and we began unloading and filling immediately. There was a mid-level overcast overnight, but that cleared right at sunrise. All that was left was scattered to broken high clouds. Temps were in the low 30s and winds were relatively light.
Payload checkout proceeded normally and we began winching the balloon out to launch position. At that point, the winds picked up to about 10 mph and buffeted the balloon a little. When we let the free ends of the lanyards go, the wind whipped them around the load line and snagged. We reeled in the balloon and cut the lanyards free, then released the payloads at 14:22:36 UTC.
We started the chase immediately afterwards, knowing we'd be 10-15 minutes behind the landing given the distance we had to drive. With Scott and Kurt ahead of us, someone would be around when it came down. We chase east to I-80, then south and east towards Red Oak on US34. As we were driving, we noticed that the backup beacon quit updating after 10 minutes or so. Later analysis revealed that the beacon was transmitting, but not sending an up-to-date position, similar to what happened on 03-E. The simplex repeater was working OK, but seemed to get weaker during the flight. Burst occurred at 1516 UTC and 57,966 ft just north of the US34/US59 intersection.
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NSTAR 03-F Flight Summary |
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NSTAR 03-F shortly before landing
(Scott KC0MTH photo) |
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NSTAR 03-F Recovery Team |
As we passed east of Red Oak, the payload was landing. Scott and Kurt were in the area to see it come down, along with Larry N0BKB, Lowell KB6SDI, and Greg N0GR. The landing occurred at 15:43:27 in a cow pasture about a mile north of the US34/US71 intersection.
For some reason, the main beacon stopped transmitting after impact, even though everything remained powered on. Perhaps the TNC experienced a power interruption. The camcorder recorded from launch to the moment of landing, but the impact with the ground stopped the record heads from applying the signal to the tape - the tape was rolling, but anything after impact remained blank tape. The still camera performed well, but the photos during the descent were mostly sky. This was due to the spiraling descent caused by the balloon remains deforming the parachute. What was unusual this time was that the spiral remained "stable" all the way down - in previous flights, the parachute would wobble as the balloon remains moved around relative to the chute.
Another note of thanks to a donor who contributed towards the flight cost.
Landing video from payload (2 Mbyte Windows Media or 2 Mbyte RealVideo)
Last updated April 03, 2005
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