Low Drag Drop Away Rail Buttons

[@PieroAcme]

There is always something to learn. My compliments George, your continuous research and development is amazing.

[@AirCommandRockets]

Cheers, thank you!

[@mabotechnology1001]

Can't wait for 2 stage water rocket update sir 😁

[@AirCommandRockets]

Horizon is being worked on in the background.... :) We're shooting video as we go so we'll do an update when we have enough to cover the interesting bits.

[@jonathans1759]

Wonderful to see A.C.R. doing their bit to stop the accumulation of space junk. It looks like they are fully reusable too. Great work.

[@AirCommandRockets]

Thanks. Yup, just pick them up and put them back on the rocket.

[@jonathans1759]

@@AirCommandRockets next you'll want to upgrade to GPS and tiny weeny parachutes. PS can't wait for horizon launch. Cheers.

[@3rd_Millennium_Engineering]

Once again, hello George! Well, I am here to tell you that the Drop-Away Rail Buttons worked very well on both my 76-mm Scratch-built as well as a modified Estes Mean Machine airframes. No problems and we found the buttons just as you'd mentioned, literally inches from the launch pad. Looks like this will be a manufacturing step in all my future builds. In fact, I'd like to eventually create a variant for a type of "Drop-Away" connectors for my booster airframes, (an in-flight disconnect system).

[@AirCommandRockets]

Happy New Year Ralph. Thanks for the feedback, glad to hear that the rail buttons are working for you. :)

[@g.j.647]

I like your high tech water rocket videos. But I love these "basic" tips, tricks and developments, that everyone can build and use. Greetings from northern Germany (9°C and raining, brrr).

[@Rocketrymandan]

Very smart design. I bet apogee rocket components would love this for their news letter!

[@3rd_Millennium_Engineering]

Hello George, I finally got to making these "Drop-away" rail brackets and buttons. I used a Simpson StrongTie ER-102 (aka ESR-2523) for the metal brackets. I'd have included photos but KZbin won't let me here. So far, so good. I haven't completed the work but will tomorrow. I am making 6 of these for 3 airframes.

[@AirCommandRockets]

Cool good to hear. Thanks for the update. You want to make sure that the buttons sit on the brackets fairly snugly, but loose enough that they fall off easily. I had to scrape the inside groove with an exacto knife because the 1st printed layer was deformed a little more when I printed the button. Good luck.

[@3rd_Millennium_Engineering]

@@AirCommandRockets Thanks, I'll post an update on the performance of these great little critters. Hey, by the way, for your readers who might be making these as well, I've found a neat trick on making these regarding where the rounded slot is. I simply choose to design around an existing hole in the Simpson StrongTie metal and then open up that hole using it as a guide. It seems to help when someone is not familiar with metal-working (as I am at the moment). Thank you again so much for sharing this great idea!

[@3rd_Millennium_Engineering]

This is wonderfully clever considering the simplicity of it! I'd sure like to use this idea on my future airframe builds and if I ever get some videos out, would like to mention your idea making sure to give you credit.

[@AirCommandRockets]

If you do end up trying the rail buttons, I'd be interested to hear how you went with them.

[@3rd_Millennium_Engineering]

@@AirCommandRockets Roger that! I've picked up some steel and now just fighting with my Ender 3 to get these printed out. My printer settings are apparently off and having a heck of a time dialing this thing in.

[@mdk2127]

Great idea George! Looks like 3D printers are gaining ground in the hobby. I've just purchased one too

[@AirCommandRockets]

Thanks Mathieu. You'll definitely never look back after you own a 3D printer, and you'll wonder how you were able to work without one. :)

[@mdk2127]

@@AirCommandRockets yes, indeed! It will definitely make things a lot easier

[@samuraiartguy]

Clever! Well done.

[@robertsteinbeiss8478]

It is really an age of science and engineering. :-)

[@spacemanmat]

Really neat solution George

[@AirCommandRockets]

Thanks Matt. :)

[@ncc74656m]

If you want more assurance that it's going to drop away, you could print it in PTFE to try to help.

[@AstroCharlie]

Really cool implementation, but I'm curious what advantages you see over a fly-away rail guide? It seems like the 'stud' the button is hanging on is still draggy, and you still have to go find the little bits of plastic after every launch. Certainly beats lugging a tower to every launch though!

[@AirCommandRockets]

All good questions. I have seen fly-away rail guides get impacted by the fins, especially on the more energetic flights. Yes the brackets attached to the rocket still have a little bit of drag, but much less than some rail buttons. If you can't find a button near the pad, you can just use another one, no need to waste time looking for them. They only cost around 2 cents each. We've been printing them in batches. The other main design criteria was the ability to fit pretty much any rail type you may encounter at a launch. Perhaps the rail you wanted is taken at the time and they only have a 1515 rail available... just pop on the bigger buttons.

[@arro_rockets]

Nice elegant solution! :)

[@AirCommandRockets]

Thanks! 😊

[@q300SBB]

Love your work George.

[@johnwig285]

This is totally awesome!! Im curious tho, if we were to play in slow mo, when the top button goes off, will there be like a sudden change in the angle of launch because the rocket now has a new pivot point which is the 2nd button that has yet to go off?

[@AirCommandRockets]

Thanks, good question. It really is no different to how normal rail buttons would act. You can still pivot around a normal single button. The time it takes is minimal from the first button leaving the rail to when the second one does. While theoretically it is possible that you could pitch over, somewhat but in practice the amount of pitch is minimal.

[@danielkemp4860]

The hooks on the Falcon9 are backwards...? Love your work! 🙌

[@AirCommandRockets]

No, I believe the SpaceX engineers installed them the correct way round. :)

[@shere_kan8329]

that's a very decent quality for an onboard video ! which camera do you use ?

[@AirCommandRockets]

We use the 808 #16 V3 camera mostly, but have also started using the mobius mini V2.

[@laurence4051]

That would be really handy being able to change from a guide rod to a 1010 and a 1515 rail to suit what is available by simply having a collection of different lugs. I'll defiantly try and implement this in a future build. I'm sure as time goes on there will be many more different custom designs for differing launchers and aerodynamic profiles that people make which will make the system even more universal.

[@AirCommandRockets]

Thanks Laurence, one should be able to print pretty much any rail profile and make it work with this setup.

[@makerbeelab5546]

The ultimate challenge - water rocket to space :) 100km up, 15 stages, firetruck of water, diesel powered high pressure compressor :).

[@AirCommandRockets]

That would be interesting... general rule of thumb is that each stage should be 5x the capacity of the next stage. That means with 15 stages, that's around 30Giga liters for the first stage. Say about 10% the volume of Sydney Harbour. :)

[@makerbeelab5546]

@@AirCommandRockets Ups, a bit underestimated. But still it would be interesting to see an estimation of deltaV. Did a quick check, 10 stages, 1kg payload, 9tons total weight, 1:6 ratio fuel/dry, specific impulse 30 (300m/s not sure if it is achievable) Total mission deltaV=2km/s. Well at least hypersonic water rocket.

[@joshp3994]

I've watched all your uploaded videos this past month and I'm inspired to pursue this hobby intensely. Do you have any guidance on how to use openrocket to construct models for simulations? I don't seen an easy way to tell it "powered by water".

[@trefferbild]

Can‘t wait for your next video!

[@RushHour2k5]

Thank you for these! I just got into 3D Printing and I'm working on a scratch build using 3D Printed components. Looking at the ZIP file you provided I see there are 4 different Rod designs, can you please advise the diameter of each or what the difference is?

[@waterrocketlab151]

I love this channel

[@jeremysim5302]

How lighter or heavier are these brackets than using a standard rain button or piece of straw for a guide? is it better to have a lighter rocket (could only be a few grams) or one with less drag? Thinking of using on a mini estes rockets

[@AirCommandRockets]

These rail buttons weigh about the same as conventional rail buttons, perhaps 1 or 2 grams heavier. These are really intended for Mid Power rockets and up, they wouldn't be useful for low power.

[@Danielastronomo]

Simple and effective, love it!

[@thorinti]

Excellent!!! , even better in minute 8:47😀😀

[@AirCommandRockets]

Thanks :) ... I couldn't resist.

[@wizzfred2]

i love your work thanks again

[@robertsteinbeiss8478]

always interested, always like to watch!

[@marcelwaldner8302]

Great Video as always ;) Is there a necessity for a guid rail when launching water rockets with a launch tube?

[@AirCommandRockets]

Good question. I would say generally you don't need a guide rail if you are using a launch tube.

[@marcelwaldner8302]

@@AirCommandRockets since we're using long launchtubes for our rockets we ditched the guide rail. And it works perfectly fine the rockets are flying straight.

[@marcelwaldner8302]

If the guide rail is much longer than the rocket or the launchtube is bending it might be a good option to consider using a guide rail

[@DeliciousDeBlair]

EXCELLENT WORK S ALWAYS GUYS!

[@trefferbild]

What I really would like to know: Is there a chance to reach the 1000 Meter (1 Kilometer or 3281 Feet) ?

[@AirCommandRockets]

I think this is very much possible. On our record flight we went to 961m at 1150psi. kzbin.info/www/bejne/hYWko3ewfJepm8k Had we used an extra 15psi we would have reached 1km. We hope to go higher when we fly our Horizon rocket as a 2 stage rocket.

[@trefferbild]

I can’t wait for that event ;-)

[@MeepMu]

This is very creative!

[@poddmo]

I don't recall from your videos that rail button drag was an issue for you. Have you noticed any changes in flight from this development?

[@AirCommandRockets]

I wouldn't expect to see much of a difference for the regular water rockets we use. This design is intended more for high performance rockets for record attempts where you are trying to squeeze out as much performance as you can. All our high performance water rockets don't use buttons, but need a launch tube or a tower to launch them.

[@poddmo]

@@AirCommandRockets ah, so the real win here is not so much for flight, but for flexibility of launch for non-high power rockets. If the bracket that's fixed to the rocket was of a standard size, you could roll up to any launch site and adapt to the local rod/rail launch system. Thank you ACR team for the humorous, hard-working and thoughtful videos.

[@AirCommandRockets]

The original design was trying to minimize drag, but perhaps the bigger benefit is the ability to adapt to different rail profiles. The bracket doesn't have to be a standard size. The buttons themselves give you the flexibility. My buttons may not necessarily fit your brackets, but as long as you have a collection of your own buttons for your brackets, then yes you should be able to fit any rail at the launch site.

[@Liverpoolfan08]

Wow I have a water rocket but it comes no where near that height but I managed to attach a parachute to it,it worked.

[@commercialaquaponics1808]

Since you use shampoo to give you additional thrust, and I assume that is because of the bubbles, why not pressurize with CO2 instead of air. The CO2 will dissolve into the water when it is pressurized, and will bubble out as it is depressurized. Besides you can get the CO2 tanks from any soda vendor.

[@AirCommandRockets]

Yes, CO2 experiments are on the road map for us. The higher molecular mass of CO2 gives you extra performance during the gas phase too.

[@shere_kan8329]

great video ! do you have STL files for normal rail button ? i made some but they look quite weak. It would be for a 20*20mm rail another question, when do you except to launch the Horizon project ?

[@AirCommandRockets]

I'm not exactly sure of what rail profile you are referring to. Do you have a dimensioned diagram of the rail profile? What size rocket are you planning to use them on? We don't have a set launch date for Horizon yet.

[@shere_kan8329]

@@AirCommandRockets www.dold-mechatronik.de/Aluminum-Profile-20x20-B-type-slot-6-standard-lengths-425-EUR-m this rail. It would be for a homemade pyrotechnique rocket, with a 54mm OD carboard tube

[@AirCommandRockets]

@@shere_kan8329 Ok, that is just a little smaller than a standard 1010 rail. I am not sure if you downloaded the STL files from my website, but try giving the 1010_2.stl button a try. That should work but may be tight. You may have to modify the design to make the groove a little narrower.

[@shere_kan8329]

@@AirCommandRockets all right, I'll take a look, thanks for your help

[@saxus]

Do you sand and polish the buttons or the rails/bars for less friction?

[@AirCommandRockets]

No, the buttons seem to glide fine without any treatment. Apparently there are lower friction filaments that could be used for printing.

[@donnieporter7890]

Super cool

[@upmanyubhati]

YAY! I'm here before people stated blessing my family

[@ajlrockets8925]

Would water rockets work in space? Just curious

[@AirCommandRockets]

If you can keep the water from freezing then yes.

[@ajlrockets8925]

@@AirCommandRockets How did I not think of that

[@sobamani1244]

Well done 👍👍👍

[@vijayanbu8933]

Good

[@picknikbasket]

Very nice.

[@vincentwaterrocket2493]

Can you make water rockets using FTC tubes

[@AirCommandRockets]

We've experimented with FTC tubes quite a few years ago, and chose not to pursue continued development with them. www.aircommandrockets.com/day69.htm and www.aircommandrockets.com/day71.htm

[@vincentwaterrocket2493]

nice

[@btrocketry3736]

Load test is always important, especially when your launching a water rocket on a angle..

[@AirCommandRockets]

Yup very true.

[@YoungPhysicistsClub1729]

wow, this was innovative

[@duncan7610]

Did you launch it in Australia. Which state is it ?

[@AirCommandRockets]

Yes, in New South Wales

[@duncan7610]

@@AirCommandRockets i thought rockets are illegal in Australia?

[@AirCommandRockets]

@@duncan7610 Nope, perfectly legal. CASA gives us the altitude clearance at our launch sites, and issue NOTAMs at the bigger events.

[@duncan7610]

@@AirCommandRockets what if you live in Melbourne, is that possible? ( sorry for bothering)

[@AirCommandRockets]

@@duncan7610 Yup, here is Melbourne's rocketry club: www.tripoli.org.au/

[@archivek]

Un poco de Todo

[@NovemberOrWhatever]

I'm sure most people already will have thought of this, but even though they are reusable you should bring a few spares with you just in case you lose/break one

[@AirCommandRockets]

Yup, we just print them in batches, and we bring a box full.

[@naveenv4227]

No videos for a month. I am so sad???

[@Websites4business]

You clever you ...

[@glenr834]

You can ask for much better than that!

[@SterremanWillie]

Very clever idea and design. You should really pursue selling the idea to Elon Musk! ;-) ;-) ;-)

[@old_guard2431]

Well done - I believe we troglodytes without 3-D printers could carve/drill/saw rail buttons out of a block of plastic, using a die grinder (aka "Dremel") for shaping.

[@AirCommandRockets]

Time to add a new tool to the workshop. :)

[@alienbeef0421]

First comment!

[@robertsteinbeiss8478]

Waterrocketscience!