How to make a rocket from a bottle - a toy for future Queen

All the pioneers of astronautics began their journey with rocket modeling. True, this was very risky, since the models worked on solid or liquid fuels, and therefore exploded once. But it was they who paved the way for large space rockets and modern cosmonautics. The model of an aircraft using the same principle of reactive thrust as the Soyuz or Proton carrier rocket can be built with your own hands. Its engine will run on mixed "fuel": hydrogen oxide (ie water) + compressed air. In principle, the same fuel was powered by powerful American engines that sent the Shuttles into orbit, and the Apollo to the Moon. We are proud of kinship!

Before we make a rocket from a bottle, let's start making a launch pad. Its main purpose is fixing the filling valve, through which compressed air will flow into the fuel tank of the rocket . The design of the launch pad is arbitrary - at least a simple metal clip in the shape of the letter "p", although a complex construction resembling a starter complex on Baikonur. The wider the starting table - the basis of the site - the more stability of the entire structure. For more stability in the corners of the site, drill holes that will help you attach it to the ground.

A filling valve is a composite structure. The basis of it is a cork, which must tightly clog the "nozzle" of the water-air engine. In it we insert a nipple from an old camera of a bicycle or automobile tire. It needs to be fixed in such a way that the air, passing through the hose to the bottom of the launch pad, entered the "fuel tank". Then the valve is fixed in the opening of the starting table, stopper up.

The next detail of our launch pad is the trigger mechanism. It is not enough to know how to make a rocket from a bottle - it is necessary to create in it a pressure sufficient for a high flight. The trigger mechanism is needed so that it does not take off prematurely. It is made from the four corners along the edges of the starting table with holes to each other, so that the freely moving in them U-shaped brace of wire securely holds the rim of the neck of the bottle. The rope tied to the cramp should be long enough that the "fuel" from the rocket does not cover the launching missile and observers.

Shells of our missiles are polyethylene bottles for water. To ensure that the rocket was more stable in flight, you can attach a fairing to the top of the fuel tank, which is served by the top of the other bottle. This is, so to speak, the basic construction. How to make a rocket from a bottle on - let your fantasy tell you: you can decorate with colors of all colors of the rainbow, you can try to turn into a kind of real coloring of space rockets, attach aerodynamic stabilizers. What are not today missiles that are made from bottles by enthusiasts!

On your marks! Our rocket, before it is finally installed on the launch pad, almost completely filled with water. The pump pumps air into it. Pressure and tension are increasing. Three, two, one, start! Our simple design is capable of climbing to the height of a ten-story house.

And what, in fact, is the benefit of knowing how to make a rocket from a bottle? We do not know. Perhaps a quarter of a century later the future Chief Designer will tell you about this, who was collecting his first, albeit bottled, missile ...