Vehicle 69 With Estes AstroCam 110

Photo flights using Vehicle 69 with a standard Estes AstroCam 110 forward-looking aerial camera, northeast Switzerland, June 17, 1999. The rocket was flown three times that day; all flights were flawless and stable and returned one analogue photo each. In addition to the camera, the payload also included an Estes Transroc II sonic beacon to facilitate locating the rocket after landing.

The launches were conducted from one of the formidable Aerotech Mantis launch pads. The first flight utilized an Aerotech E15-7W single-use composite motor, the second was conducted with an Estes D12-7 black-powder motor. Vehicle 69's final photo flight of the day made use of an Aerotech D13-7W RMS reloadable composite motor. The rocket was initially lost upon recovery; we only managed to find it after a lengthy search.

The red hue visible on the right in the aerial shot is an old school analogue photo development artefact. Top photo shows Vehicle 69 in Thalwil, Switzerland, on June 8, 1999.

Estes AstroCam 110 Conversion

I purchased my first Estes AstroCam 110 in July of 1980, at a toy store in Marina Del Rey, Los Angeles. At the time, obtaining photos taken from a flying model rocket wasn't a trivial matter; before the advent of widespread digital photography and advanced miniaturisation, it took considerable ingenuity and resources to achieve that goal. Moreover, by second half of the 1970s, Estes had decided to discontinue the earlier, somewhat cruder Camroc camera and the associated Camroc Carrier rocket, the only dedicated consumer model rocket camera.

We were thus delighted when Estes' 1979 catalogue announced the new AstroCam 110 camera (then sold with its dedicated Delta II carrier rocket). Rudimentary by today's standards, the AstroCam 110 still represented obvious technical progress when compared to the Camroc. It required manual advancement of the film after every picture taken, and it operated by means of primitive but relatively fail-safe system consisting of a simple spring-loaded shutter, triggered by a string trapped between camera and rocket body up to the point of parachute ejection.

Nonetheless, the AstroCam 110 was user-friendly and utilized a standard high-speed Kodak Kodacolor 110/ASA 400 colour film cartridge, and the resulting photos could be developed just about anywhere. We felt slightly disappointed, however, by the fact that the AstroCam 110 was a forward-looking device; we desired to take rearward-looking photos showing the rocket's fins and its smoke trail. It was obvious that a home-made conversion was required.

Years later, I thus modified at least one AstroCam 110 to such a rearward-looking configuration and launched it a number of times on a dedicated carrier rocket, Vehicle 71 (top photo), designed for C, D, and E motors. The conversion was not quite as simple an undertaking as I had hoped, as it required rethinking the triggering system. Taking into account the limitations of the pre-digital age and a mere model rocket as carrier vehicle, the results were very pleasing, however. This is evidenced, for example, by the launch and flight photos above, taken in northeast Switzerland, on June 17, 1999.