GRAYLING, Michigan USA — Todd Moore of Sky Ripper Systems stated late last week that the company will begin accepting orders on their 54mm nitrous oxide hybrid rocket motor systems in one week. The expected date to begin accepting orders is slated for Monday, June 11th.

The latest manufacturer to join the ranks of certified hybrid hobby rocketry motor providers, Sky Ripper Systems was recently granted certification by the Tripoli Motor Testing (TMT) arm of the Tripoli Rocketry Association. Paul Holmes of TMT announced the long-awaited certification of the new 54mm hybrid motor line back in February.

Sky Ripper Systems' 54mm hybrid motor.

The 54mm hybrid line consists of three sizes: short, medium and long with two versions for each size case. The two difference versions are controlled by utilizing a different set of drilled injector plugs, which are easily identified by either a natural brass or black color. Sky Ripper Systems motors use conventional fill-at-the-pad nitrous loading utilizing a 3/8" fill tube inserted up through the nozzle in conjunction with a vented forward closure.

The time since the certifications has been spent getting final preparations in order to go into production. Moore is still getting adjusted to running the business on his own since original Sky Ripper partner Tracy "Woody" Wood made the decision to spit from the company back in March. Wood's career appeared headed into overdrive and the subsequent decision was wholly supported by both parties.

Moore's odyssey with Sky Ripper has been long, with the abnormal delay in motor certifications consuming the better part of a year, while manufacturing anomolies manifested themselves with the motor grain manufacturing firm using the wrong materials, sending 1000 motor grains into the trash. Moore took advantage of the setback to make small changes to the grain geometry to cure an oddity that was observed in a late-term test flight.

Early this year, Sky Ripper made the decision to scrap traditionally-used paper documentation in favor of supplying the instructions on a mini CD-ROM. In addition to the documenttion on the disks, Moore has stacked the deck by using both assembly videos produced in-house and those produced by Chuck Rudy of VooDoo Productions on the CDs. The Sky Ripper 54mm in-house assembly video can be seen here:

Moore's plans include producing instructional videos for their 29mm and 38mm product lines in the near future, to be included with each system they sell. Sky Ripper is currently beginning a production run of 29mm hardware to be followed shortly thereafter with a run of 38mm hardware.

All of Sky Ripper's motors use pre-heater grains consisting of less than 30 grams of APCP, which makes the reloads legal to ship through the standard United States Postal Service channels ready to use out of the box.

For more information on these motors, and the complete line of Sky Ripper Systems products, please visit http://www.skyrippersystems.com/.

06-03-2007 11:11 PM  #1
Steve_Shannon Growing more clueless...   Joined: Aug 2006 Posts: 2287	No written directions (Oh my god!) While the use of an assembly video is innovative, I am the type (anal to a fault!) who likes to tape the instructions to my work table while I am at a launch and check off the steps as I go. If I invest in a Sky Ripper motor I will put together my own check list from their printed instructions, which are still available on their web site.

06-04-2007 09:09 AM  #2
DumasBro2 I Felta Thi Frat Boy   Joined: Aug 2006 Posts: 303	There is a pdf file on the cd as well of the written instructions so you can print them from there as well.