Fun day at Bong

Had a great time at Tripoli Wisconsin’s launch today at the Richard Bong State Park (Bong to us local’s) just over the boarder in Wisconsin. Tim “Wildman” Lehr grilled the entire crowd free lunch! Work has kept me from most of the launches this year, so this was my first time launching from our new spot in parking lot “E”. The spot isn’t bad, except it’s right next to the bathrooms which limits our ability to launch anything larger than a K motor. Hopefully with the announcement of LDRS coming to Bong next year we will once again be able to use our primary spot in the middle of the park. The weather was absolutely beautiful and perfect for flying. I participated in the annual Minie Magg drag race, even though I didn’t even know it was scheduled! One of my daughter’s liked the look of the rocket, so we brought it along. Unfortunately, I didn’t stick the landing . Parachute didn’t deploy,  so I had to scrape the remains of the rocket off the side of the road. Also launched my scratch built Nike Smoke. Perfect Launch, but it went so high it landed in the back half of the park which is all swamp and lake. We never did find it . Kids had a blast launching from the low power pads. Tried several new rockets, including a few gliders with mixed results. One big lesson… don’t put an ammonium perchlorate based motor into a light glider. We spent quite a while picking up the shredded pieces across the flight line. My good buddy Aaron brought two of his boys up to watch as well. Always fun to see new kids get excited about the hobby.