I have recently made 3 rocket motors based on sorbitol
I still had 2 left over, so I decided to try them instead of letting them absorb moisture and become useless
Since the previous one was such an unsuspected success we have changed our launching method
Instead of launching from inside a tube we taped a stick to the side and put it in a pvc pipe hammered into the ground
The pvc rocket failed to launch due to bad fusing, so only the paper one achieved liftoff
The fuses went out before or during the entering of the nozzle, probably due to moisture, bad quality and excessive deprivation of oxygen
This happened at least 10 times, probably more, and stopped me from launching more than one rocket in the time allocated
I will be working on a electrical NiChrome ignition system and better fuses in future
Launch
As you can see above it did not quite go to plan
At T+ +-250 milliseconds after liftoff it gave a loud “Pop” and the rocket lost thrust and did 2 loops before landing in the grass, still burning
Conclusion
My hypothesis is that at t+ 250ms the packed clay nozzle blew out, probably due to increased chamber pressure due to the better fuel used and the inferior strength of such nozzles
I will probably have to design and build a different type of nozzle if not rocket to use this fuel well
Tomorrow I will hopefully be launching the left over pvc rocket and testing out a better camera I got from my brother (thanks bro!)