Union Grove High School – Page 10 – On the Wings of Angels

Wednesday, First WSMR Launch Day-Rockets 2017

Today was an extremely early morning for the SystemsGo team and program participants, Fredericksburg High School, Union Grove High School and Alamo Heights High School. They were all up at 2:00 this morning headed to the range, here at WSMR to test. They had success in that they met all three T times for the day with only 20 minute variances.

Fredericksburg STEM Academy was first to test, leaving the rail at 6:20 a.m. It started off well with what looked to be a beautiful flight, but it was short-lived. It quickly lost thrust climbing to only just over 300′ before nosing over, refiring, and plowing into and along the range. Luckily, the nose cone shoot deployed shortly before impact, taking it away from the harsh landing. WSMR optics reported the vehicle only reached a speed of just under 100 ft/second, but still managed to travel 920′ down range.

This was not quite the flight students had hoped for, but for today they hold the flight record for these three launches. Even though, the schools are not competing against each other but awarded only on their own accomplishments, students all want to have the most successful flight of the season. Of course there are four more tests tomorrow.

SystemsGo was able to have Union Grove loaded on the rail, filled and ready to fire in just over an hour and a half. Their rocket had a 7:55 T-time. The rocket had ignition and began to lift off, but about two feet up the rail the the engine skirt sheered resulting in the engine landing on the pad while the body of the vehicle continued up to the top of the rail, and then slid back down until the end hit the ground where it stood continuing to dump the remaining Nitrous from the tank. The final impact with the pad dislodged the nose cone sending it to the ground. Union Grove students at Mission Control, had at first thought that their injector had blown out, but upon inspection after the failed launch, the injector was found to be intact. The students are still problem solving to determine what caused the mishap. This is a good learning curve for future of the Union Grove program.

Even with the 30 minute required wait time before approaching the Union rocket to remove it from the rail, Alamo Heights was loaded on the rail and attempted testing their rocket at approximately 9:40. They had ignition, but no lift or burn. Students are sure the Nitrous valve didn’t open. This vehicle also sat on the rail until wires from the engine stopped smoldering. It was quickly determined that it could not be repaired for retest today, and the call to complete today’s mission was made. Alamo Heights is seen here, working to repair the vehicle this evening for a last slot retest at the end of the schedule tomorrow. It was very impressive to see both the students at the launch site and those at Mission Control begin problem solving and discussions on what went wrong as well as ideas on how to repair the vehicle.

SystemsGo did great work meeting these very stringent T-times today.

Tomorrow’s schedule is another early one, but luckily nowhere near as early as today’s. They are all going out to the range at 5:00 a.m. to prepare for a beginning T of 8:00 a.m. If the schedule holds, even with a possible fourth test, they should be packing up the range by 3:00 p.m.

The following is the schedule at this time:

Thursday launch order:

8:00 a.m. Anahuac
10:00 a.m. Booker T. Washington (1)
12:00 p.m. Booker T. Washington (2)
2:15 p.m. Alamo Heights (Retest)

Event details will continue to be available here. Information will be available late tomorrow evening after all tests are complete and the range has been packed up. Pictures are not allowed on the range, but some pictures of teams getting ready to leave for the range with their vehicles might be available. If anything is available I will post it for your viewing pleasure.

www.systemsgo.org as always is the place for more information on this program. You may also email them at info@systemsgo.org .Take the time to get your school involved, the future of your students will be greatly benefited.

Tuesday, T-1 Briefing and Set up Day at WSMR and Wednesday Schedules

SystemsGo and the participating schools had a productive first day at White Sands Missile Range (WSMR) today. They started the day with the T-1 Briefing, which included several presentations by WSMR staff on all they do to make these launches possible. It was an educational and informative session.

WSMR personnel made introductions so all involved would know who they are and who to contact for help from the base. At the end, Scott Netherland introduced the SystemsGo team and specified their roles with the organization. We finished around 11:00 and headed out to West Center 50 launch site(WC50).

All equipment and rockets had to be set up and completed to meet the Wednesday testing schedule. Everything was eventually finished by 8:00 p.m. It was a very productive day albeit a little long and quite hot. It was a bit of a “Murphy’s Law kind of day”.

The first incident was our truck running out of diesel about 6 miles from the launch site. Gary, one of our range specialists, came and saved the day for us. Then the fill and fire system wouldn’t work correctly, only to discover that it was a bit of human error not system error. We were able to find humor and relief in the fact that it was actually all ok. One of the generators ran out of fuel as well. The last thing for the day was a screw on the rail that prevented the loading of the Fredericksburg rocket and much maneuvering had to be done to fix both the rail and the rocket lugs to get it loaded so we could all finally go home for the evening. There were other minor things, but it was all things that could be fixed.

Tomorrow will be a super early morning for all of us. Teams launching and SystemsGo personnel will be headed out to WC50 at 2:30 a.m. And those going to watch the launches from Mission Control will be heading out at 3:30 a.m. to meet our rep at the main gate by 4:30 a.m.

6:00 a.m. Fredericksburg High School
7:30 a.m. Union Grove High School
9:00 a.m. Alamo Heights High School

If it is a perfect day and all goes well with no exceptions with each launch, then the tests should be complete by 12:00 p.m. Realistically, this is a very tight launch sequence with little to no room for errors. If we do not get all three launches tomorrow, then there will be four launches on Thursday. Friday has now been canceled as WSMR has other high priority missions that need the range, so there is no longer a back up day.

Therefore, let us all hope and pray for the best for each school so that they may have a successful launch tomorrow and that all schedules hold true.

Here is the current preview of the launches scheduled for Thursday. Tomorrow’s blog will have a final schedule for the day based on Wednesday’s test success.

Thursday launch order: Anahuac, Booker T. Washington (1), Booker T. Washington (2)
Event details will continue to be available here. I will provide more information each morning as to how the schedule and other event details will progress for that day and how launches went for the schools testing that day. Pictures are not allowed on the range, but some pictures of teams getting ready to leave for the range with their vehicles might be available. If anything is available I will post it for your viewing pleasure.

Monday Rockets Headed to White Sands-Day 1-Report and Tuesday Early Information

The SystemsGo team left Fredericksburg at 9:00 a.m. this morning headed to White Sands Missile Range (WSMR) in New Mexico. They arrived in Alamogordo, NM, for lodging at 5:30 this evening. All participating schools also arrived safely.

Tomorrow is an informational and set up day. SystemsGo personnel and all students, teachers, and parents from the schools head out at 6:30 a.m. for T-1 briefing and a short presentation by each school on their vehicle and it’s expectations. Afterwards SystemsGo, students and necessary personnel go to West Center 50 launch site to set up and prep vehicles. Parents will be dismissed at that time to find their own entertainment for the day.

Wednesday is the first launch day and at this point, it is slated to be an early morning. Fredericksburg STEM Academy is first up to launch for the day and the current schedule has them testing at 6:00 a.m. The hope is to test 3 vehicles by 10:00 a.m, including Union Grove and Alamo Heights.

Event details will continue to be available here. I will provide more information each day as to how the schedule and other event details will progress for that day and how launches went for the schools testing the previous day. Pictures are not allowed on the range, but some pictures of teams getting ready to leave for the range with their vehicles might be available. If anything is available, I will post it for your viewing pleasure.

www.systemsgo.org as always is the place for more information on this program. You may also email them at info@systemsgo.org . Take the time to get your school involved; the future of your students will be greatly benefited.

Team photo includes from left to right, Josh Hampton, Gene Garrett, Steve Burow, Kasey Burow, Rebecca Hyatt, Scott Netherland, Brian Heffner, and Ginger Burow. Not available for this picture, Chelsea Burow and Andrew Matthes. Chelsea joined them in Alamogordo, and Mr. Matthes traveled with his students.

Fredericksburg STEM Academy/Rocket Program-Launch Report for Rockets 2017 WSMR Launch Week Red Bird #18 Update

Red Bird #18 is scheduled for testing at White Sands Missile Range(WSMR) next Wednesday, June 28. This marks the last big event for Rockets 2017 and the Fredericksburg STEM Academy for this season.

These are the Goddard level rockets, which are the culmination of all the skills the students have learned throughout their years in the STEM program. This marks the final senior project for those schools that participate in this level of the SystemsGo program.

According to team member, Sterling Weatherford, “We are finishing up our rocket production, with integration and final testing before we head off to White Sands.”

Mr. Matthes reports that welding on the vehicle is complete and it is together. Below is a pictures of the class with the vehicle at SRM Manufacturing, one of the outsource businesses they contracted for help with welding. In order left to right the students are Jesse Cedillo, Colby Marthaller, Ricky Robles, Langston James, Nathan Bain, Chase Ottmers, Hannah Boubel, Joseph Sanchez, and Sterling Weatherford.

Other members of the group not pictured here are David Becker, Drew McDonald, Matthew Dulaney, Corbin Styles, Josh Treibs, Payton Carroll, Cody Pruett, Levi Crawford, and Ian Kendrick.

The students report that they are putting finishing touches on the nosecone, including sanding and a gel coat to create a smooth finished surface. They will be installing the complete motor system in to the rocket today, Wednesday, June 21.

They had been working on integrating the recovery, propulsion and fuel grain systems into the vehicle. All parts have been fit tested for the integration. Recovery, avionics, and the payload have since been successfully installed.

They are finishing the assembly of the fuel grain including an ablative that the students have chosen to add to the post combustion portion, afterwhich they can install the fuel grain and the rest of the propulsion system into the rocket.

Here one of the students shows the injection valve and injector bell arrangement.

Here is a picture of Drew McDonald, Ricky Robles, and Jesse Cedillo earlier when they were mixing fuel for the second attempt at the fuel grain.

Their final actions will be to test the black powder charges for the recovery system and then they will be ready to move the rocket to WSMR for their full vehicle launch testing.

“We are extremely excited to test our rocket at the upcoming White Sands Missile Range launches,” Sterling reported.

Monday evening they met to discuss travel plans and trip expectations.

Launches are scheduled for June 28 through June 30. The group will travel out to WSMR on Monday, June 26, and back home again on Saturday, July 1.

There are 5 schools scheduled to launch 6 rockets. These schools include:

Alamo Heights (1)
Anahuac (1)
Booker T. Washington ( 2)
Fredericksburg (1)
Union Grove (1)

This year is unique in that the Army has some classified tests scheduled that will slightly overlap SystemsGo’s air space on both June 28th and June 30th. This could delay start on Wednesday, and it has already been set to 0700. The hope is that all launches will be complete by Thursday afternoon so that Friday will not be needed since another high priority group will be needing that day as a back up day as well. SystemsGo will travel home Friday if this can be accomplished instead of one day later on Saturday.

The current launch schedule is as follows:

Monday, Jun 25th Travel Day
Tuesday, Jun 26th T-1 and Site Set up/Rocket Prep at WC-50
Wednesday, Jun 27th Launch Day One (Three Rockets – Fredericksburg, Union Grove, Alamo Heights)
Thursday, Jun 28th Launch Day Two (Three Rockets – Anahuac, Booker T. #1, Booker T. #2)
Friday, Jun 29th Contingency Day/Travel Day
Saturday, Jun 30th Travel Day

Both the Junior and senior groups presented there projects and made reports on June 1st as their final exam for the year. Below is the junior group after their presentation.

This article is the eleventh in a series, new for this school year ’16/’17 of updates that have followed the Fredericksburg STEM Academy/Rocket program. This school is a participant of the SystemsGo STEM program. This series of articles is intended to support, encourage, and challenge students in the program as they share their working status and accomplishments throughout the year in the program. These publications will be available for tags and re-posting.

Subsequent updates will continue to follow the Senior/Graduates and the progress of the Red Bird #18 rocket after launch at WSMR next week.

Today is 5 days out until the Red Bird #18 group leaves for WSMR. Watch this blog next week for information and reports on this and all the schools’ launches at White Sands Missile Range.

This was presented to the Red Bird #18 group after their June 1 end of year presentation. The sentiment still holds as we congratulate this group of graduates on their accomplishments and the achievement of finishing their rocket. Good luck at WSMR!

#Rockets2017 #SystemsGo #FredricksburgSTEMAcademy #Launcher01

Rockets 2017-Friday Day 2 Report and Saturday Schedule

Friday had another slow start for rockets. The ceiling was a low again. SystemsGo was able to load 24 out of 25 rockets listed on the schedule onto the rails and launched all 24.The 25th was an abort by one of the schools.

Here are a few of those smiling faces taking their rockets down to the pad.

The north end of the range seemed to be the prime spot for landings today, which kept recovery in that area fairly busy. Unfortunately that left those of us on the south end a little bored so we went to help our northern friends quite often. So then how many recovery teams does it take to find one rocket?

As is normal, Transonics amassed most of those still missing in the field. They also made up the bulk of the final ones shot due to waiting on that cloud ceiling to clear. Coordinates for those have been generated, and the search is ongoing.

David Willden and the group from New Mexico helped out until around noon when they had to launch themselves back towards home. There help was greatly appreciated, and for them it was also further training for next year’s second launch series in Jal.

Phil Houseal was busy interviewing spectators, students and volunteers today. He even managed to catch me and coerce me into another interview this year. We seem to have a continued game between us. We both prefer to be behind the camera instead of in the pictures, so I make sure to catch him and get him in the pictures I post, and he catches me and makes me talk on camera.

Tomorrow is another big day on the range, with a full docket of rockets and extra curricular activities after launches are done as well. It will be a busy and long day. It should be fun though. Hopefully the cloud ceiling will open up earlier so we can start those rockets in a more continuous pattern. And the rain can hold off until after dark and all will be good.

Below is the launch schedule for tomorrow, Saturday. There are 7 schools launching a total of 22 rockets tomorrow.

Saturday, May 20, 2017
School Name	# 1st Level Tsiolkovsky	# 2nd Level Oberth
Akins High School Joyce Sayce	5
Fabens High School Manny Moreno	3	2
Henrietta High School Doug Underwood	2	1
Maypearl High School James Herrod	1
McGregor High School Chris Kuhl	1	1
North Lamar High School Kathy Stewart	1
Northwest High School Elizabeth Mitias	4	1
7
Schools Launching
Totals	17	5
May 14^th Total Rockets	22

The following is a link to the album of pictures from today’s launch. Have a look you and your school rocket just might be in there.

https://www.facebook.com/ginger.burow/media_set?set=a.1477962108891582.1073741889.100000334203350&type=3&uploaded=221

Good luck to all the schools launching on Saturday. I will update the blog after we complete our day again tomorrow. Here is the link to the live stream again.

http://livestream.com/systemsgo

Please remember that although there is no charge for the event, and these launches are open to public viewing, parking and seating is limited due to safety requirements. For this reason, SystemsGo has a provided a link for you to pre-order tickets for those in your party. This also provides SystemsGo with a way to monitor the number of people in attendance each year. This is in no way meant to discourage your attendance, but is instead to help them provide a great experience for students and spectators, while doing all possible to monitor safety issues and attendance numbers at any one time during the launches.

http://www.systemsgo.org/events/

Event details will be available here each day of the event. Daily reports featuring schedules, school names, results, pictures and some editorial content will also be posted.

#SystemsGo #Rockets2017 #FredericksburgSTEMAcademy #Launcher01 #SystemsGoNewMexico

Fredericksburg Rockets 2017-Thursday Day 1 Report – Friday Schedule

Thursday went well. It started off a little slow due to clouds and a low ceiling. Fortunately, it burned off in the afternoon and launches started lining up with only intermittent delays. it was basically a warm, humid, and windy day, but turned out well in the end for rockets. Recovery went fairly well with only a few Transonics still in the field at the end of the day. Hopefully they will still be recovered before the end of the weekend.

Original Fredericksburg High School STEM teacher and SystemsGo originator and program developer was on site today. He visited with folks, observed how things were working and even worked the Pad until around lunch. It was a nice treat having him on site a while again. He even said he might drop by again before the weekend is over.

We also had working guests from the new SystemsGo New Mexico. Director David Willden was helping a mission control as well as one recovery team that was from his group too. #SystemsGoNewMexico

The original schedule listed 22 rockets, but the final total launched was 19.

Below is the launch schedule for tomorrow, Friday. There are 7 schools launching a total of 25 rockets tomorrow.

Friday, May 19, 2017
School Name	# 1st Level Tsiolkovsky	# 2nd Level Oberth
Buinger CTE Academy Michael Skrzynski	2	3
Hamilton High School Seaborn Achby	1	1
Marble Falls High School Leslie Alexander	2	1
RL Turner High School Bill Richardson	2
Tom Moore (Ingram) High School David Bunch	4
Union Grove High School Greg Park	2	1
University High School Dennis Oubre	4	2
7
Schools Launching
Totals	17	8
May 13^th Total Rockets	25

The following is a link to the album of pictures from today’s launch. Have a look you and your school rocket just might be in there.

https://www.facebook.com/ginger.burow/media_set?set=a.1476991132322013.1073741888.100000334203350&type=3&uploaded=143

Good luck to all the schools launching on Friday. If I get a chance to do some updates during the day tomorrow , then I will but don’t count on it. It will probably just be one at the end of day. Here is the link to the live stream again.

http://livestream.com/systemsgo

Please remember that although there is no charge for the event, and these launches are open to public viewing, parking and seating is limited due to safety requirements. For this reason, SystemsGo has a provided a link for you to pre-order registration tickets for those in your party. This also provides SystemsGo with a way to monitor the number of people in attendance each year. This is in no way meant to discourage your attendance, but is instead to help them provide a great experience for students and spectators, while doing all possible to monitor safety issues and attendance numbers at any one time during the launches. These tickets are FREE. They can be found on the SystemsGo Events page. Look for the little ticket icon that says, “Admit One”.

Event details will be available here each day of the event. Daily reports featuring schedules, school names, results, pictures and some editorial content will also be posted.

#SystemsGo #Rockets2017 #FredericksburgSTEMAcademy #Launcher01 #SystemsGoNewMexico

Friday, SystemsGo’s Rockets 2016 Officially Ends as Team Travels Home and Transitions into Next Year Preps

At 7:30 a.m. this morning, the SystemsGo team and Fredericksburg students traveled home from White Sands Missile Range, arriving safely in Fredericksburg around 5:30 p.m.

WSMR marks the end of another successful year with launches in Houston, Willow City included. The group helped test 90 Tchaikovsky and Oberth rockets and 7 Goddard level rockets for the Rockets 2016 season.

Now the volunteer staff returns to their daily lives and the SystemsGo team enjoys a much needed break before continuing with more schools, students and rockets. It won’t be long and the “launch season” will be back again with Rockets 2017. This coming season will start a little earlier with launches in April for the new New Mexico schools that will be coming online. It should prove to be an exciting year.

For now, SystemsGo transitions back to helping schools and teachers implement this STEM based program so that more students can participate in this system of learning.

That concludes Friday’s WSMR Rocket update.

www.systemsgo.org as always is the place for more information on this program. Take the time to get your school involved, the future of your students will be greatly benefited. SystemsGo is a Texas-based STEM curriculum program.

Team photo includes from left to right, (SystemsGo founder), Cade Ottmers, Brian Heffner, Josh Hampton, Chelsea Burow, Gene Garrett, Steve Burow, Randy Kuhlmann, Robert Dever, and Andrew Matthes (FHS STEM program instructor).

Thursday, Final WSMR Launch Day

Today was the final day of testing at WSMR for SystemsGo student programs. Fredericksburg was the only official launch scheduled, with two remaining test times for any retests needed. Unfortunately it was a sad day for Fredericksburg as well. Their rocket had ignition but the injector failed therefore it never left the pad.

At first they were going to allow them a second test time at 12:30 p.m. but after inspection it was determined that they did not have enough spare components to repair the vehicle and so the second test was scrubbed.

At that point the SystemsGo team, Fredericksburg students and WSMR personnel cleaned up West Center 50 and left, officially ending our White Sands Missile Range launch operations.

This evening the team gets some much-needed rest time before returning to Fredericksburg. Except for Chelsea and Steve they are returning to Lubbock this evening and then to Fredericksburg on Friday evening. The team and the Fredericksburg students spent the afternoon seeing the New Mexico Museum of Air and Space and the White Sands National Monument, where they met the challenge of climbing and sliding down the dunes.

Tomorrow is back to Texas and a long Fourth of July Holiday weekend.

There were four out of seven rockets that left the rail this year. Seven out of seven would have been even better but this is still a good end to the season. The thing to bear in mind is that with all these tests whether they leave the rail or not there is always and element of further knowledge to be obtained from what transpired with each vehicle. That deducing, understanding and learning from both what went right and what went wrong whether the vehicle launched of not, and all the education and skills each student learned to get it to this point is the true important lesson.

Thank you so much to White Sands Missile Range for all the support, man power, time, education, entertainment, information and fun you provided in order for SystemsGo and these four schools to come out and test their vehicles. Your continued support in this education of future generations is highly appreciated.

The picture on this blog piece is of the Fredericksburg rocket team this morning prior to their vehicle test. It was provided by team member Zane Brown. Team members are from left to right: Katie Habecker, Link Millard, Dorian Jones, Garrett Ottmers, Nathan Weatherford, Alex Scudder, Zane Brown, and teacher, Andrew Matthes.

Late Update to Wednesday, Launch Day 2 at WSMR

This is just a quick update to my earlier post. Booker T Washington has decided not to go for a retest on either of their failed rockets today. That means Fredericksburg is tomorrow’s only attempted launch test. It’s T time is 8:30 a.m.

Wednesday, Launch Day 2 at WSMR

The Anahuac rocket left the rail this year at 8:36 a.m. It traveled 171 meters (appx. 576.27’). The Estes motor blew out at ignition as the rocket started its lift off. This caused the rocket to spiral upward and eventually nose over and continue into the range a few hundred yards to the right of the launch rail, digging a crater and leaving dust for some distance. The Anahuac teachers were prepared and blew party horns to celebrate as soon as the vehicle came to rest. Congratulations Anahuac on your first successful launch!!!!!

The next two T times were both held by Booker T Washington High School. Both of these rockets were carrying a payload consisting of a PVC container with space pebbles that they were testing to see how they would react upon reentry to the earth’s surface.

Unfortunately it was not a good day for Booker T. They achieved success in making it to the pad, but flight was not to be. Neither vehicle left the pad.

On the 11:00 a.m. test of Golden 5 the Junior class rocket, the valve froze shut not allowing the Nitrous Oxide to mix with the fuel at ignition resulting in a small puff of smoke and a misfire.

The 2:15 p.m. test of their Senior class rocket, failed due to a fault in the ignition wire which resulted in no ignition and the system venting out the Nitrous. There is no word at this time as to whether either vehicle will be able to retest in one of tomorrow’s two available retest T’s. Even if one of the vehicles can be repaired in time there may not be more Nitrous available for them to conduct any additional testing.

At this time, the 8:30 a.m. T time is scheduled for Fredericksburg’s Red Bird #17 rocket. If no other retesting occurs, then the mission will be complete, then clean up and pack up will end the day for SystemsGo, students, and WSMR personnel.

Good luck to Fredericksburg and tomorrow and safe travels to all schools heading home.

Tomorrow’s test schedule is as follows:

8:30 a.m. Fredericksburg
11:00 a.m. Retest (1)
2:00 p.m. Retest (2)

Event details will continue to be available here. I will provide more information each morning as to how the schedule and other event details will progress for that day and how launches went for the schools testing that day. Pictures are not allowed on the range, but some pictures of teams getting ready to leave for the range with their vehicles might be available. If anything is available I will post it for your viewing pleasure.

The picture was provided by parent, Teresa Moore, of the Anahuac High School Rocket team after their launch here at WSMR. Students pictured are (not in order) Anne-Marie Henry, Madalyn Orozco, Maria Magana, Kaitelynn Innerarity, Mason Duhon, Shon Patton, Dante Nguyen, Beau Cendejas, Austin Hodges, Meghan Thomas, Zack Rose, and Caleb Moore.

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