NASA went through a succession of delays with Artemis so I'm not too disappointed that I didn't have the blowtorch on full blast yesterday.
Did the first attempted firing out of doors. Kerosene in the tank, meths in the dip on top of the tank. Lit the meths to warm the burner. When it was almost used up, gave the pump a few strokes and was rewarded by a single fine stream of kerosene - it went quite a distance, several yards. Applied a match and the stream lit. But what I now had was a burning stream of kerosene, not a flame coming out of the nozzle. Tried a few times and tried holding the match right to the nozzle. Side note - soon realised, once soaked with kerosene, the matches could not be extinguished.
Couple of times, the flame was near the nozzle and could hear the familiar roar just beginning. But it would only burn as long as I kept a match in play.
At the end of the attempt I just had a large puddle of kerosene in the back yard. Future escapades will be in a different location and with better provision for discarding burning matches.
My thoughts are. Perhaps the burner is not getting hot enough to vaporise the kerosene? Perhaps I need the little brass mesh thingy inside the fuel pipe. In fact, I wonder if the function of the brass mesh is to slow down the flow of pressurised fuel, giving it more time to vaporise?
Today, had a go at pushing the brass mesh back to where I now regret pulling it out from. Too many prepositions in that sentence but you might see what I mean? Didn't want to go back, of course. Unwound the brass mesh, cut a little bit off, rolled it tight and persuaded it to go back up the fuel pipe.
Next launch attempt TBD.
Did the first attempted firing out of doors. Kerosene in the tank, meths in the dip on top of the tank. Lit the meths to warm the burner. When it was almost used up, gave the pump a few strokes and was rewarded by a single fine stream of kerosene - it went quite a distance, several yards. Applied a match and the stream lit. But what I now had was a burning stream of kerosene, not a flame coming out of the nozzle. Tried a few times and tried holding the match right to the nozzle. Side note - soon realised, once soaked with kerosene, the matches could not be extinguished.
Couple of times, the flame was near the nozzle and could hear the familiar roar just beginning. But it would only burn as long as I kept a match in play.
At the end of the attempt I just had a large puddle of kerosene in the back yard. Future escapades will be in a different location and with better provision for discarding burning matches.
My thoughts are. Perhaps the burner is not getting hot enough to vaporise the kerosene? Perhaps I need the little brass mesh thingy inside the fuel pipe. In fact, I wonder if the function of the brass mesh is to slow down the flow of pressurised fuel, giving it more time to vaporise?
Today, had a go at pushing the brass mesh back to where I now regret pulling it out from. Too many prepositions in that sentence but you might see what I mean? Didn't want to go back, of course. Unwound the brass mesh, cut a little bit off, rolled it tight and persuaded it to go back up the fuel pipe.
Next launch attempt TBD.
