They're kinda blaming the GNC for the recovery failure, when really it
sounds like the real root cause is that they didn't have a dip tube in
the LOX tank of a blowdown system.
http://copenhagensuborbitals.com/preliminary-impressions-nexo-flight-event/
Any sufficiently complex guided liquid rocket should have a dedicated
independent receiver (or at least an easy command over telemetry) for
"fire the parachute". SpaceX learned that one as well.
I was impressed how much the engine bay/fin can collapsed when it went
under water.
https://twitter.com/CopSub/status/757154670091591680
https://twitter.com/CopSub/status/757007385894457345
On Sun, Jul 24, 2016 at 4:25 PM, Ben Brockert <wikkit@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
CS is finally back in the air after a couple years of no launches. The
energetic founder Peter Madsen left in 2014 and started another group,
and it took them some time to get back into a launching state. The
launch was about four and a half hours later than announced the day
before, but they managed to launch on their first launch attempt day.
Here's the video: https://youtu.be/5mQ8bz1E6V8?t=12011
It's LOX with 75% ethanol 25% water, in the style of ze germans. Steel
regen engine with film cooling, 500kg thrust. A descendant of the
Atlas vernier engine in form and function.
The guidance worked well, it flew very straight up even at a fairly
low speed. It has four graphite jet vanes, again ze germans. Thrust
appeared to cut out early, I haven't heard why yet. The recovery
system didn't run at all, so we didn't get to see the ballute and
reefed main. They are a rare project in the rocketry world in that
they seem to have put a proportional effort into recovery as engine
work. Not that it did them a lot of good this time.