JP Aerospace Blog

There is a new vehicle that we will be flying with Tandem.

The new vehicle will be both a chase vehicle for Tandem and chance to run really high.
It’s called the Mesospheric Explorer 2 (ME Too!).

The Mesospheric Explorer One was flown about 10 years ago. It was intended to break our altitude record of 130,000 feet and be the start of a series that would reach the Mesosphere (160,000 feet). The ME One vanished at 30,000 feet never to be heard from again.

ME Too will use two of the big Tandem balloons (the Tandem backups). However instead of 62 pounds like the Tandem it only weights 11 pounds.  It will climb fast and high.

It’s carrying four HD video cameras covering 360 degrees. Our goal is to launch it 30 minutes after Tandems launched. It will then get great in flight images of Tandem as it passed her at 50,000 feet. It will then keep heading up to over 120,000 feet.

Here she is to scale at peak altitude:

The team pushed hard on Tandem Saturday. There were lots of small changes and one big one.

The big change was the recovery system. After it’s flight Tandem releases it’s balloons and deploys a parachute. We had a large parachute cannon near the nose that used a cold gas and piston system to throw out the chute. Last week we conducted six ejection tests. It worked but pretty anemic. I was really looking for the parachute to be thrown five to six feet away from the structure. We been making steady improvements on it, however it really needs a bit of a redesign and there just isn’t time. We decided to go back to old, reliable basket deployment that we use on Away missions. Off came the cannon and on went five baskets and small chute arrayed down the length of Tandem. The good part is that we saved 2.5 pounds, unfortunately we ate up that weight in bigger propulsion batteries. The change meant that we had to do a complete rebalancing of Tandem.

Other things accomplished:

All camera housings completed and two mounted.

Motor RPM and temperature sensors mounted.

New motor controller housing insulation sleeve made.

Main system controller wiring harness modified.

Corner bumpers made and installed.

An interview with JP was just posted over at the “Next Big Future” website.

“Floating Airships”

I have been privileged to live in the time of Steve Jobs.

Away 44 was a high rack that launched two small rockets in April 2010.  I hiked in the next day to  recovered it. However, by the time I got to it was getting dark, I was exhausted and there was no was I was going to be able to climb back over the two ridge lines carrying the thing. It took about 20 minutes to pull all the systems and camera off Away 44 and load them into my pack before heading back out.  Getting the  structure, wiring and antennas would need to wait for another day.

Well, last Wednesday was that other day. Taking ‘the around the mountain and up the valley (no climbing) route’ I got to the landing site in just a few hours of hiking.  Away 44 was gone. I was pretty sure the last person there was me and before that nobody had been there  for about 100 years.  After walking a spiral out from the coordinate it was pretty clear it just wasn’t there and I began the trek back to the truck.  Not long after a caught a glimpse of a white piece of foam sticking out of the dirt. It was a 5 inch triangle landing bumper.  Tumbleweed. It jumped into my brain that without the equipment the High Rack frame and decks would act like a big tumbleweed. I started walking a search pattern in the direction of the surface winds on the original launch day. You could only see about 30 feet due the the train and brush so I walked a 1/4 mile by 30 foot search pattern. About an hour in I came across a fin. It was in ready to fly condition except the blue fabric had completely faded. That game was a foot!

After another hour a had to give up and start heading back. I had made the decision the moment Away 44 appeared out of nowhere only 16 feet in front if me.  A shallow ravine and the bushes kept it out of site.

The vehicle was very much intact,  just couple of broken poles and very eroded foam. No much is reusable, maybe some of the poles, I just don’t like leaving anything out there. Also it was a good excuse for a excellent hike.

A reminder to keep hydrated.

The way road and the truck are down in that valley somewhere.

Away 44 ready to go home.

The team has been really cranking. Here’s last Saturdays accomplishments:

Tracking systems preped and tested for Mesospheric Explorer II

Repaired loops on 3ooog balloon launch bag.

Changed Tandem data manager subsystem from 9v to 11.2 volt, main and backup unit.

Mounted Tandem controller and battery housing for live video system.

Finished Tandem swinging antenna mount.

Finished Tandem parachute cannon piston.

Added retention mounts and lines to parachute cannon piston.

Test live video system.

Made new top loading video camera box.

Modified Tandem main controller program to accommodate extended relay board.

Setup test ground station.

Test Tandem parachute ejection, (fired through the main controller).

Mounted all three decks on Mesospheric Explorer II.

Mounted and tested mini-beacon on Tandem.

Mounted and tested mini-beacon on Mesospheric Explorer II.

Parachute basket mounted on Mesospheric Explorer II.

Made Tandem’s main parachute bridle.

Repaired mounter mounts and crew module mockup.

Successfully fired and small rocket motor with a laser (all our future rockoon launches will use laser ignited motors).

The Tandem got a new camera mount and housing and Sky Pup’s parachute’s mounting plate was almost completed. Paul put the finishing touches on Tandem’s second balloon launch bag then started in on patchwork and repair on the high rack balloon launch bag. After seventeen launches this year is was getting a little frayed.

We assembled two more high rack frames and lastly we began mounting the live video system on Tandem.

It was a solid ‘crossing things off the list’ day.