Model Forum / General / Rockets / February 2008

www.chicagotribune.com/news/chi-rocketmenjan18,0,4435685.story

Appetite for propulsion

With solid rocket fuel and a lust for thrust, an extreme hobby launches
itself onto the radar of the feds

By Mike Anton

Tribune Newspapers: Los Angeles Times

January 18, 2008

LUCERNE VALLEY, Calif.

The pickup with "Official Rocket Recovery Vehicle" on its side bounced
across the rutted dry lake bed kicking up silt. Andy Tryon glanced over his
shoulder at his baby cradled in back. In a few minutes, his crew would
gently place the Desert Hawk on the launch pad and arm it with an igniter.

Showtime and Tryon was nervous.

The rocket represented three months of labor. He needed to solve the
engineering flaw that doomed the Desert Hawk's three previous launches. The
camouflage paint job alone took two weeks. On the rocket's fins were
inspirational quotes from the Bible, Shakespeare, the heavy metal band Molly
Hatchet and the theme song from the television show "Star Trek: Enterprise."

"There's a heck of a lot of trial and error in this hobby," said Tryon, a
41-year-old from Victorville, Calif., who drives a forklift for Wal-Mart.
"We refer to it as the bug. Either it bites you or it doesn't. But when it
bites, it bites in a big way. Did for me."

Tryon's goal is to make a name for himself in the competitive world of model
rocketry. If that conjures up images of a junior high science fair, think
again.

The Desert Hawk is 10 feet tall and weighs 126 pounds. Launching it required
high-altitude clearance from the Federal Aviation Administration. It's
fueled by a mixture of ammonium perchlorate and synthetic rubber; known as
APCP, it's essentially what powers the space shuttle.

What was once a simple boyhood hobby spawned by the Cold War's space race
has transformed into extreme rocketry, a subculture dominated by middle-age
men.

"The final result of all the work is that you light a motor and there's a
big old bunch of noise, smoke and flames," said Richard "Wedge" Oldham, who
lives in the San Fernando Valley and builds replicas of vintage Cold War
missiles. "That appeals to guys."

ATF calling

It also got the attention of the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco,
Firearms and Explosives. In recent years, the bureau has tightened
regulations on the purchase and storage of APCP, which it classifies as an
explosive. Even small amounts of APCP can require a federal permit and a
background check.

Heightened scrutiny since Sept. 11, 2001, threatens to affix training wheels
to the hobby, said Ken Good, president of the Tripoli Rocketry Association,
which along with another group has been locked in an eight-year court battle
with the agency.

"What's going to happen when an 18-year-old tells his parents, 'I've got a
new hobby, but I've got to get a low explosive user's permit and, oh, by the
way, the ATF is going to inspect our house to make sure it's being stored
properly,'" Good said. "The kid's parents are going to say: 'Gee, can you
find another hobby?'"

Or as Oldham put it, "The ATF is worried that someone could use these things
as a weapon. We're lucky if we can hit the sky."

Oldham, a wiry 50-year-old with steel blue eyes and a habit for Marlboro
Reds, is well known among extreme rocketeers. ("Wedge is somebody I'd aspire
to," Tryon said.) He is among fewer than 100 rocket builders who tackle
projects big enough to warrant attention at international events such as the
annual Large and Dangerous Rocket Ships convention and the revealingly named
BALLS launch in Nevada's Black Rock Desert.

He also was among scores of rocketeers who gathered in November at the
federally managed Lucerne Dry Lake east of Victorville for the biannual
ROCstock, an event sponsored by the Rocketry Organization of California.

As Tryon readied the Desert Hawk for launch, Oldham drew a crowd simply by
displaying a motor he used recently to propel a 700-pound model of a Nike
Ajax missile -- without a warhead, of course -- to a height of 14,740 feet
in 30 seconds.

'Totally enthralled'

Oldham stumbled onto extreme rocketry like many of his peers did -- in
middle age when he introduced his childhood hobby to his teen son.

"As a kid in the early '60s, when the U.S. got into the space race, I was
totally enthralled," he said. "Eventually the Navy and girls got in the
way." Unbeknownst to Oldham, model rocketry had super-sized in the
intervening years. It was no longer just a kid's game. His son grew bored
with rockets. Oldham grew more intense.

"I wake up thinking about rockets and I go to bed thinking about rockets,"
said Oldham, a software engineer who keeps three framed photos of his most
beloved projects on an office shelf where others might have family pictures.
"It's not a hobby. It's a passion and obsession."

It's Tryon's obsession, too, and on this day he launched his Desert Hawk,
pressing a button that sent an electrical charge to the Desert Hawk and
ignited its fuel. Thick black smoke spewed from the rocket's tail. It
lurched from the desert floor and roared into the atmosphere

"Go, baby, go!" Tryon said.

- - -

Want a missile?

Get a mortgage

Richard "Wedge" Oldham's Nike Ajax missile cost him $10,000- $8,000 from a
refinancing of his home. His next project, a 45-foot-long replica of a Nike
Hercules, will cost twice as much. "It'll go supersonic. About Mach 1.1,''
Oldham said. 'I don't know where the money is going to come from. I just
know I'm going to build it."

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