Smash Rocketry New Group Project – The Proton M

[smashburn]

PROTON SCALE DRAWING FROM ROCKETS OF THE WORLD

Thanks Greg, I have that same diagram. I’m using it for most dimensions, but don’t like the payload area .. doesn’t look quite like the images I’ve seen.

What an awesome book though!! Got my Delta II specs from there as well.

Yep, I see the request was from some time ago. It sounds like the Delta II was a great group project!

To get the look right on the Proton, make sure and add a big ‘ol American Flag as if this was launching an EchoStar satellite.

Maybe they can sponsor the launch. What is the budget for this project?

Thanks .. the build budget should be modest .. few hundred or so(beyond what I have already invested. I have a lot of parts, fiberglass, epoxy, etc already. However the motor budget is nuts!! With an “O” and possible 10 – “K”s .. it’ll reach $1000 easily. Once I get this going and can show some real progress .. I’ll put a donation link like I did with the Delta. Club members and friends were really generous and helped make that flight happen.

[Greg Sartz]

For the nose cones for the six boosters on the first stage, if we had a set of full size drawings, we could then make templates to work with and I could carve the cones out of foam and then we could glass them. That would keep them pretty light, yet very easy to make. The nose cone for the whole rocket could be done the same way. I have made nose cones, prop spinners, reducers, couplers, etc. and learned how to do it when I was using 1/4″ plexiglass glued together to make the same sort of shapes for the models of oil refineries that I used to make years ago.

I’m in the process of putting together a CNC Hotwire cutting system similar to this one:
http://www.foamlinx.com/foamlinx_medium_hot_wire_cnc_foam_cutters.html

if that would be of any help. I’m hoping to get it up and running this Spring.

It looks like the idea of a LARGE nose cone in foam has been done as in the case of this X-15 project:

http://www.rocketryforum.com/showthread.php?t=409&page=2

[BEAR]

If you look at the three or more links for the card stock launcher, I think you will see something interesting. The rocket is, as you know transported to launch pad laying down horizontally on a huge, long rail car. I know it has to be strapped on somehow, but I did not see it yet. When the rail car gets backed up to the correct location so the tail can go down into the hole in the ground, then an erection gantry come out of the ground, latches onto the rail car as raises this whole assembly vertical, and in to launch position. Then another gantry come over to it, for final preparation. I do not know who this Russian modeler is, but he has some great information on his site, and he must have twenty different Russian rockets there (taking license for exageration here) Explore the sites, I think you will really be surprised. I may have to print the Proton M out on card stock and build it so I have a better idea of what I am looking at. Who knows, build it sturdy enough, and replace card stock with tubes, it might be flyable? As for the first stage, I think you could keep it more accurate, for scale effect, if all seven of the first stage motors were mounted in the sona tube. You would have to cut through the tube walls at the base, and install a complicated set of bulkheads that would hold all seven motor mounts, then at launch assembly, you slide the booster tubes over the tops of the motor mounts and bolt those on. Not quick and easy, but certainly doable with the right tools. I think I might start with a large pylwood disc, and then cut out the outer tube rings and shape the profile, then drill the holes for the motor tubes. It’s your bird, I am just thinking on ways that it could be done.

[BEAR]

Thanks for the link on the X-15, Greg. That was way cool, but very sad. So how is the RockSim coming? Is this going to be enough to get it to 4 or 5000 feet? As for the foam nose cone, I think that would be easy, inexpensive, and quick. If we mounted a clothes rod throught he center, we could find a way to chuck that up and turn it like a lathe at a low rpm and turn it cutting with a hot wire, (like making foanm wing cors witha template) and then files and sandpaperfor final dimensions. Glass it while it is there and then sand with out taking it off of the home made lathe will work, (this does not have to be a powered shaft, but could be hand turned as long as it can freely move between the two centers) and then cut the rod off and sand to finsihed shape at the apex of the nose cone.

Steve, In regards to shock cord anchors, I found on line some forged eye-nuts in all different sizes for a good price, so all-thread anchors could be used and then screw on an eye-nut for your shock cord anchors.

On the Proton, where will the first stage come apart for chute deployments,and how does the first stage separate from the second stage for the airstart?

[Warren B. MusselmanModerator]

Thanks guys, you’re all giving me goosebumps with the memories of the Delta II project.

My thoughts… based on several large group projects I’ve been involved in (Delta II, uprOar, unLeashed, etc.)

– Make design decisions and get accurate drawings together before you cut a single piece of material.
– Do NOT do composite tubing on paper or concrete forms. For anything N or above, buy commercial composite tubing. The savings in labor will more than offset the additional cash cost. This is one of THE primary reasons to do it as a group project.
– Everyone kicks in 1/X th of the cost. Everyone pays an equal share of the costs – this can include donation of stuff mind you, motors or avionics or construction materials. What matters is that all the participants feel that they have contributed fairly from a financial point of view. Those who commit greater labor to the project do so for the joy of doing so.
– Minimize group labor. Have specialists – someone whose role in the project is full responsibility for aspect ‘X’. An avionics guy, a mechanical designer, a motor guy or guys, a composite guy, a recovery system guy.
– Have frequent face-to-face meetings between various specialists and anyone whose work is interacting.
– You really need a minimum of 5 people – airframe/fins, avionics, motor, recovery and the central project manager and they all need to communicate a LOT during the design phase.
– Once design is done and signed off by consensus of the full team, fabrication is best handled by the smallest group possible.
– Above all have a central project leader/manager who coordinates everything. He doesn’t have to be a technical expert, he just has to have the overall goals in mind and to have enough technical expertise to be able to evaluate and manage what they are doing.
– Don’t let the project leader dictate finances. Make that something that ONLY comes from consensus. Just because one of you bastards is a cheapskate doesn’t mean the project should fail. Slow down and make it come out right.
– Be flexible. Don’t rush the project if you want it to come out right.
– Most of all, don’t under-motor and don’t make final decisions about motor impulse until you have a clear idea of the final dry weight.
– Practice full assembly and flight readiness before you show up to Mile High Mayhem or Oktoberfest. While I’m not the greatest exemplar in this department, groundtest the hell out of complex projects.

I can say that 2 of the finest experiences in my rocketry career were the large group projects of the Delta II and uprOar projects. These both involved 6-8 project participants. Both had perfect first flights – although the Delta II was underpowered for its weight and the uprOar didn’t fly as origially designed, both had perfect virgin flights. I learned more – both in technical matters and in personal relationships in these projects with these people than anything else I’ve ever done in this hobby. The Delta project was the only thing that could have prepared me for the uprOar and those projects were the only things that could have prepared me for unLeashed…. and those experiences were the only thing that could have prepared me for things like my L3 and the unLeashed. (Let me tell you that building a successful O powered project before you do your L3 is quite an ego-boost).

In any event, I’d love to help with this project and still have shitloads of glass, carbon, kevlar and all the v-bagging materials necessary. Doing a group project of all this magnitude is possibly the finest joy I’ve ever found in rocketry.

[Kevin OslerParticipant]

Whoa, just reading up on this project. Sounds amazing.

Well, I have no $$ and even though I have my Level 2, I am definitely still a noob to HP rocketry, but I live in Longmont and can sand, glue, whatever to help this along…. Message me if you can use me in any way, sounds like an amazing learning experience.

Kevin

[smashburn]

Whoa, just reading up on this project. Sounds amazing.

Well, I have no $$ and even though I have my Level 2, I am definitely still a noob to HP rocketry, but I live in Longmont and can sand, glue, whatever to help this along…. Message me if you can use me in any way, sounds like an amazing learning experience.

Kevin

Hey Kevin .. you are definitely welcome to join in. I hope to have our build site worked out this weekend .. it’s in Longmont too.

Thanks!!

[smashburn]

In doing further exploration, there is a website: http://www.cardmodels-r.narod.ru/html/images/Proton/proton-m.pdf, that shows instructions and patterns for building a model of a Proton M (and another site that does the Proton K).

As our Chief Researcher you are the man for this task. Warren really believes we should drop the boosters in flight, as we did on the Delta, for the obvious Cool-Factor. However, I am not sure they do drop off on the Real Proton. Looking at the pics it does not look like it .. especially since there is no center motor .. just the outboards. Can you confirm this one way or the other. Thanks!!

[SCOTT EVANS]

As our Chief Researcher you are the man for this task. Warren really believes we should drop the boosters in flight, as we did on the Delta, for the obvious Cool-Factor. However, I am not sure they do drop off on the Real Proton. Looking at the pics it does not look like it .. especially since there is no center motor .. just the outboards. Can you confirm this one way or the other. Thanks!!

WHO REALLY CARES!!!!!!!! I think “Cool Factor” is way more important !!!!!!!!!

And really now! Who’s really gona know! 😉

If that Russian Scientist shows up at the Launch, and starts to “flap his gums” there will be enough of us there to tell him where they went wrong, and why! 8)

My old Boss use to say, “If Dodge wants there name on the Truck. Let them Buy it” “Now get that off of there and get my sign on” 😆

Besides, I am sure, the Proton I saw over Wheat Ridge the other day, Dropped its Boosters.
“I’m sure of it” 😉

[BEAR]

Those thing-a-ma-jigs on the side of the rocket that we are calling boosters are the main engines. The central tube is a fuel tank and has no engine. It uses the same dangerous (and I do mean dangerous rocket fuel as the old Titan II missile that launched Gemini; like hydromorphous red fuming nitric acid) So in reality, there is no central rocket motor on the first stage, it is the six motors around the circumference that launch this thing. Of course if you want to have a center motor and drop the booster pods, as we have been calling them, that is cool. It is just sort of a sport scale rocket that is huge, expensive to launch, and looks a whole lot like a Proton M. (Or we could make it super scale and use the central tube as a fuel tank and get six liquid fuel motors soo we……. Probalby too complicated and certainly out of my current experience level, but would be way cool.) (where are the Rol-Aids?)Which ever way it is built, I know it is going to be hugely entertaining. I am into scale myself, but with all the details we do not have, getting it right down to all the details is impossible, so we do what we want. My next concern is can we get it high enough to get deployment of the chutes (5000 feet would be really cool) and do we have enough redundancy built into it so that it doesn’t fail. Reading these posts, I think that is being taken care of. Of course we are going to have to scratch a few things. We have already deleted the below ground pit the rocket sits in and launched from, because there is no way we are going to ask the rangers for permission. Second thing that might have to go is the railroad tracks out to the erection gantry, and we will have to make some decisions about this since the erection gantry is underground also. When it is operated, it comes up and latches onto the rail car the rocket is mounted on for transport. Then the whole thing is raised into the vertical position. Then, the bindings that have secured the rocket to the railcar are released, and the erection gantry is lowered back to ground level, the rail car is released and pulled away. Then it can be launched. Considering this was supposed to be an ICBM, this seems really cumbersome. Anyway, we may have to scratch the concept of railroad tracks, rail cars, and underground gantrys. I just cannot se us getting buy with that and not have the ranchers blow a gasket or have a conniption fit. Now if we could get a trailer, have the rocket mounted on a laucnh rail already, rasie this asembly vertical, attach an extension to the top, and launch it from the end of the trailer, this oculd be pretty cool and efficient to. Probably not worth it unless it already exists within the club and is volunteered. 4 months till launch is pushing it. Lets see, is it T minus 131 days? So what are you/we going to do and how are you/we going to build it? I guess we shouldl also see about, for construction purposes, about 4 saw horses that have cradles built into them so we can support the two stages while we are building them. Those can be built now while we are figuring out the rest, once we have a place to build it. Better yet, anybody have a couple of hospital gurneys that we can use? Put cradles on them and build on top of them. We have a built in table for assembly, we have wheels to move assemblies out of the way, and they can elevate so when we mate the stages, it goes more easily.

[Author]

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