Bee Eee Blog

I’ve been launching water rockets for a few years now. I’ve toyed with a couple of complex mechanisms for deploying a parachute: tommy toys, electronic circuits, solenoids. I never got far enough on any of the methods to attempt a launch. Just a couple of days ago I ran across the simplest mechanism I’ve seen at www.water-rockets.com. I was a little doubtful that’d it work, but it was so simple I had to try it.

It basically consisted of a paper nose cone that sat loosely over the nose of the rocket. The parachute was taped to the rocket and folded nicely under the paper nose cone. When the rocket was launched and reached apogee it would turn over. As it turned over the nose cone would fall off and expose the parachute to the wind; the parachute would open up and carry the rocket down safely.

Here is the basic water rocket:

and here it is put together:

So how did it work? Not too bad. I tested it on two different runs. I used just air, because it’s getting a little chilly here in Utah and I didn’t want the full thrust that the water would provide anyway.

The first set of runs I didn’t have the little ledge around the bottom of the nose cone; the nose cone came off very easily, sometimes even before I launched it; but it worked about 80% of the time. For the next set of runs I added little strip of paper about 2 1/2″ thick along the bottom of the cone. The newly adjusted cone stayed on much better. In fact it stayed on so much better it didn’t come off during the flight (Thus the dent in the picture). I cut off half of the lip — same problem. I cut off event more. This time it came off when it was suppose to and spared my rocket another nose dive.

Now I put in some water and went out to the pasture to give myself some more space. While setting up the launcher I of course had to kneel in some dogs parting gift. Anyway forward, forward in the name of science. I got it all setup and let it go. It went alright straight up and straight down. The cone stuck too tightly; it probably had too much horizontal speed and the force from the wind kept the nose cone on. Anyway it got smashed pretty good.

All in all the loose nose cone method works about 60% of the time. I’m sure it would have worked better if it’s construction was of higher quality. It is EASY to make unlike other methods I’ve seen. And best of all it’s a great kid pleaser. My kids danced and oohed and awed over it. I’d definitely recommend this method of parachute deployment especially for beginner.