KINGUSSIE, Highland UK — The group of UK rocketeers responsible for the Top Gear Reliant Robin space shuttle launch in 2007 made another launch this summer for a BBC TV's kid's television show better known for making models from empty dish washing soap bottles and adhesive-backed vinyl called Blue Peter.

According to the UKRA website, Blue Peter hostess Zoe Salman contacted UK's "The Rocket Men" to help design and build the Blue Peter rocket and to help locate a discreet site appropriate for launching the show's first "space mission," which was launched from the Balavil Estate earlier this summer. The estate, owned by Allan Macpherson-Fletcher, was the perfect place to launch the 28 foot-tall rocket with it's 152mm Contrail Rockets O-6300 nitrous oxide hybrid motor.

Just before the May 27th launch date, an unmarked convoy of vehicles arrived and set up their equipment, and after a small anomoly involving a nitrous fill line, the rocket lifted off around 8:00PM for flight.

After reaching an altitude around 3,000 feet, the rocket experienced a parachute problem when the drogue parachute failed to properly deploy.  The main parachute did deploy correctly, while the nose cone with the fluttering drogue drifted off separately.

"It landed about 400 yards away from the launch site in two sections, and everything was filmed by a camera on a model aeroplane," Macpherson-Fletcher was quoted as saying. "We had to be careful that the rocket didn't set fire to the hill – that was my main concern – but everything went fine in that regard."

"I've been involved in the construction of the rocket from the start, and seeing it ready for take-off in the middle of the most breathtaking Scottish heathland made me feel pretty emotional," Salmon stated. "I had learned all about how rockets work, but the launch itself was so exciting, it felt more like a drama than a documentary. We have now got to decide whether it's time for Blue Peter to enter the space race!"

Congratulations to Damian Hall and Colin Rowe of The Rocket Men for this launch and their receiving the 2008 George Abbey Award for their work on the Top Gear Reliant Robin launch. The award, presented by the Sir Arthur Clark Awards, is named for their special guest that year, George Abbey, former Director of the Johnson Space Center in Houston. Abbey had really enjoyed watching the activities of The Rocket Men, who were recognized as "the team whose space achievement made us laugh the most."

08-26-2008 06:27 PM  #1
ksaves2 Certified Level Two   Joined: Sep 2006 Posts: 26	Re: Article: Popular UK Blue Peter TV show featured hybrid rocket Nice flight but I've seen folks here in the states do projects like that routinely in a nominal fashion. The difficulty of doing it with a hybrid is commendable. I hear our UK brothers/sisters are more hassled over AP motors than we are? Now the Top Gear shuttle flight was something and I felt badly when it failed. I disliked the embellished "explosion" at the end. That would have been a hell of a flight if it had performed nominally and survived. The SRB separation on that flight was wild. Too bad there was a control problem. Kurt

08-26-2008 06:50 PM  #2
Init 6 Certified Level One   Joined: Nov 2006 Posts: 17	Re: Article: Popular UK Blue Peter TV show featured hybrid rocket Getting AP in the UK got a bit easier a few months ago. IIRC less than 1kg of NEC and you don't need a licence. Any more and you're back to the old licence issue, which wasn't that arduos. Where we do have an issue is with the cost of motors. Because of all the hassle with importing 'explosives', motors tend to cost twice the US price. That in itself probably limits the number of big projects.