Hey Tom,<br><br>Wow indeed! I would go to this for sure, except I will be attending the wedding of an old friend in LA Saturday. Doubly ironic since I am in San Diego these days, and my girl friend's son is stationed in El Centro, about 20 miles from Plaster City.
<br><br>Since I have been down that way several times in the last couple years, let me offer a helpful hint. When you ask Google maps for driving directions from "pasadena, ca" to plaster city, ca", it gives you a route of 217 miles each way; right past my place in Carlsbad. If you grab ahold of the blue route around Oceanside, and drag it over Palm Springs, and drop it on the 10 freeway, you'll get a new route of 218 miles from Caltech to Plaster City. The two are about the same distance; taking the 10 through Indio and past the Salton Sea is probably going to be an easier drive. The 8 East from San Diego has a 4000+ elevation gain and high winds for about 60 miles before you drop down to Plaster City.
<br><br>jeff <br><br><div><span class="gmail_quote">On 10/1/07, <b class="gmail_sendername">Emerson, Tom (*IC)</b> <<a href="mailto:Tom.Emerson@wbconsultant.com">Tom.Emerson@wbconsultant.com</a>> wrote:</span><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;">
> -----Original Message----- Of Thomas G Moore<br>><br>> Having never been there, are more detailed directions<br>> required than just Plaster City?<br><br>>From the "plaster blaster" website<br>[
<a href="http://www.plasterblaster.com/launch_site.html">http://www.plasterblaster.com/launch_site.html</a>], it looks like it's<br>about 80 miles EAST of San Diego -- for most of us here, "that's a bit<br>south of us..." ;)
<br><br>Google link to a map of the area:<br><a href="http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&hl=en&geocode=&q=plaster+city&ie=UTF8&ll">http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&hl=en&geocode=&q=plaster+city&ie=UTF8&ll
</a><br>=32.791892,-115.856323&spn=3.038298,4.943848&z=8&iwloc=addr&om=1<br><br>(which, if you decode the URL, you'll see has GPS coordinates -- go<br>about mid-way on the zoom-slider to see both our area and the launch
<br>site area in the same frame)<br><br>Per the routing function of google maps, the drive should be between<br>3-1/2 to 5 hours -- launching typically begins around 8:00 am for events<br>like these, so we're talking about leaving here around 4am (earlier if
<br>you want breakfast somewhere along the way...) it's 200+ miles one way,<br>so I know I'll be going through a tank of gas that day -- anyone want to<br>carpool? [I'll have to leave the launch by 4pm at the latest as I'll
<br>also be doing something in Simi Valley that night -- hey, it's the 21st<br>century, where are our star-trek transporters when you /really/ need<br>them?]<br><br>And to answer Claude's questions in the same off-topic message: The
<br>rocket will be powered by four "M" motors (*), one in each afterburner.<br>The rocket will take off in "attack" mode (wings in an "X"), then<br>transition to cruise/landing mode (wings flat) in fligth. Two man-rated
<br>parachutes will be used to return the rocket safely. (yeah, gliding in<br>would be cool, but I don't know anyone gutsy enough to try and fly it<br>via radio-control...)<br><br>Tom<br><br>(*) Motor designations: model rocket engines are rated in
<br>NEWTON-SECONDS, which are broken down into ranges for easy reference.<br>Each range is designated by a letter (A, B, C, etc.) in which each<br>successive range is double the previous range. The "A" range is
1.26 to<br>2.5 NS (therefore, "B" is 2.51 to 5, C is 5.01 to 10.0, etc.) 4 "M"'s<br>is in the same power range as 2 "N"'s, which is then the same as a<br>single "O" motor [the legal limit for California] The next part of a
<br>motor designation is the AVERAGE THRUST per second. [divide the total<br>by the average to get the actual burn-time in seconds]<br><br>It is rumored that the motors for this will be M1600 "Redline" motors<br>
[so named due to their characteristic red flame] which have a total<br>thrust of 7085NS and burn for approx. 4 seconds. (generating 400 pounds<br>of thrust, BTW)<br><br><br></blockquote></div><br>