Building Rockets

 I begin this post by acknowledging my many, many failures in life and as a parent.  First, my many failures with physics and my thought that its laws were suggestions.  And the fact that my husband and I, not exactly the model parents, think its appropriate to all the three year old's hobby to include explosives.  However, it is incredibly, incredibly cool.  The good folks at NARHAMS Model Rocket Club # 139 hold public launches at NASA Goddard's Visitor Center on the first Sunday of the month, at 1 p.m.  We stumbled upon this after visiting on the first Saturday of the month.  Jamie has been bugging me about letting ChaseKBH build model rockets for about a year, however, I vetoed previous attempts because we had no reasonable place to launch.  And our family has issues with fire.  NARHAMS and Goddard  to the rescue.

We built two simple Estes model rockets for the launch, purchased from Michael's, using standard Estes engines.  ChaseKBH's rocket is a Estes Riptide, adorned only with his name in black Sharpie.  He chose it because it was blue.  The Riptide deploys a parachute to cushion its landing, after ejecting its nosecone.

In our house, these items are referred to as "fire pressure" rockets.  Previously, ChaseKBH launched some air pressure rockets.  We explained that these rockets are launched after a spark ignites the engine, which burns and provides energy to launch the rocket upwards.  ChaseKBH invented the term fire pressure. While I don't think he exactly gets the physics, he does understand ignition --> fire --> push the rocket heavenward.  Not terrible for someone who doesn't yet have a preschool education.