The porcelain body of the new generator is done. It should be able to handle the higher temperatures of the larger motors. In a hundred years I wonder how much it will go for on the Antiques Road Show?
We’ve stripped down the smaller generator and are rebuilding it as a multi channel unit. It will have four electrodes initially. It should be ready to test this weekend.
A morning in June 2006. Away 27 about to launch with 600 PongSats.
Here’s Paul and Drew working on the crew module mockup.
After the motor detonations on test 17 and 18 we build a new MHD generator. This one was designed to handle larger rocket motors. We did the first test tonight. Test 19 went great. Lots of power and lots of data. However, (there’s always a however) when we disassembled the unit after the firing we found cracks all through the ceramic. We always expect to see a few little crack due to thermal shock. The unit’s core temperature goes from ambient to 2000 degrees F in about a second. This time the unit was ruined, cracks everywhere going clean through. We start building the next unit tomorrow, but this time out of porcelain.
courtesy of www.hybridblimp.net
When the motor on test 17 exploded I thought it was just an old motor. When the motor on test 18 also exploded I dug in and figured it out. These tests were the first to use a larger motor with the Mini MHD Generator. The back pressure from the restricted flow through the generator caused the motors to fail. Add another data point in MHD design.
I never knew just how a big of a bang a ‘D’ motor can make when it really lets go!
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The Sacramento chapter of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics is holding a PongSat Contest. The contest is open to 7th and 8th grade science classes in the Sacramento area. The PongSat mission to be flown next March is open to anyone on Earth. We have space for approximately 600 PongSat student experiments. This will be a balloon flight to the edge of space.
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