Photo gallery: http://photos.psas.pdx.edu/blackrock2004
We're trying something new this year: short updates from the desert, posted on this page. Most of the team departs Thursday, September 9th, so watch for news.
This a test from the Black Rock desert. James; Could you let me know it this get posted? Thanks!
Glenn 10-Sep-2004
Well we survived our first day on the playa, and a productive one at that. It looks like either late today (before 5pm) or early tomorrow (around 10am) we will launch! Yay!
Our local weather weatherman (Bruce) reports yesterdays weather highlights. ..
High Wind 25 mph Typical wind 15 mph High temp 89 deg F Low temp 51 deg F Humidity 6%
Glenn 11-Sep-2004
Hey all:
For those that don't yet know, due to real high winds (20 to 30 mph with 40 mph gusts) sustaining almost all day, and dust white-outs, we did not launch, and Trina, Bruce and I left the playa a little early. Some of the more intrepid members of the team stayed on for one more night.
Well we just now got home, and I just talked to Andrew and Brian who were among the intrepid ones, they are not too far behind us.
Even though we did not launch, this trip was a real adventure and I think we accomplished and learned a lot. Particularly we learned how lucky we have been all along to have always had nice weather.
Trina has presented a challenge for next year; The 25+ mph wind speed bacon & eggs cookoff. This years record was 48 minutes, and 1/2 can of propane! :)
Great trip!
Glenn 13-Sep-2004
A looming deadline and isolation from distractions lead to a lot of work completed:
- Ground infrastructure setup (Ian, Glenn, Andrew, Jamey)
- New APS power supply board completed (Tim) with firmware (Andrew)
- New Recovery node completed (Tim) with firmware (Andrew)
- New two meter radio completed (Tim, Glenn, Keith)
- Armed, Rocket Ready, Launch Abort, Boost, Coast, Deploy Drogue, Descend Drogue, Deploy Main, and Descend Main sequencer states drafted (Ian, Jamey, Bart)
- Added support for new APS and IMU nodes (Ian)
- RocketView support for processed GPS and IMU messages (Peter, Jamey)
The rental truck made a wonderful work area. Truly a basement away from home, with a gorgeous pre-dawn view of the moonrise which we saw far too often. :)
On the propulsion side, Brian et al made several spectacular and successful night-time hybrid test fires including the world's first salami test fire, which created a 60ft meat spray and had thrust spikes that exceeded the parafin firings! Perhaps the Cheeze Whiz accellerant had something to do with it...
-- IanOsgood [2004.09.14]
I have placed Bruce's weather data on this page.
Glenn 15-Sep-2004
Words from Bruce... Here are the weather .CSV files, one from each console. They should be basically identical. Note that shortly after noon on Friday there is a glitch in the solar radiation and UV reading due to moving the station to its final site about 550 ft. out.
- BR2004-1.csv: Weather data from Bruce's Station
- BR2004-2.csv: Weather data from Bruce's Station (Console #2)
Attachments: