To date, Rick has cast three grains for the DSS BP motor. After casting the first grain, Rick reported. "I must say, once I got everything together and working it was the easiest grain I have ever casted. Because of the size, I had lots of room to pour, it was quick, not a single dribble or spill".

Grain, still in mould, with mandrel extracted

Rick received the SS2S stickers sent by Richard last week. These stickers were easily and inexpensively made using Avery 18665 "Clear Full-Sheet Labels" printed using an inkjet printer. Also sent were some iron-on SS2S logos made using Avery 03275 "T-Shirt Transfers".

Team logos

Paul Avery continued progress on the water deluge system and motor test stand parts. This past Wednesday, Paul wrote: "Today I added some delrin sliders to the test stand brackets, and also did a test fit of the deluge pipe in the casing now that I have all the components. No issues here and the pipe slides right through without contacting the mid-bulkhead. Will take it to FAR on Saturday and hopefully do a flow test so I can put that issue to rest."

On Saturday, Paul Avery, Rick Maschek and Thomas Dittman were at the FAR site to test out pyrogen igniters, test the water deluge system, continue work on the test stand, and to try out the thrust and pressure measurement equipment.

Trial fitting of the DSS BP motor in the test stand

Paul marking the location of the load cell thrust plate

Measuring the flow of the FAR water supply system

An Avionics telecon was held on Sunday. Participants were Chris King, Mattias Lampe from Team Selene and Richard Nakka. The main purpose of this telecon was to discuss open action items and assign due dates.

Craig Peterson has completed the task of re-working the DSS BP motor closures attachment screws and has sent the screws to Paul Avery. Craig turned down the screw head diameter by a small amount to provide for easier installation.

Bert Kimpe kindly volunteered his services to perform a structural load test on the prototype fins fabricated by Marco Torriani. The testing machine that Bert has access to is the Tinnius Olsen H25K(t) model benchtop tester.

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