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Tripoli Rocketry Association
2008 Board of Directors Election Kenneth J. Good - Articles  The Road to the Modern Tripoli by Kenneth J. Good, TRA #00132 Almost thirty-five years ago, some of my friends and I, all keenly interested in the Space Race, flying machines, and science in general, started dabbling in a newer hobby that was emerging: Model Rocketry. I completed my first rocket, an Estes X-Ray, sometime in 1966 and decided that for my first launch, just popping the rocket into the air seemed a little less than exciting. I therefore bought one of the more healthy-looking chameleons that the local Woolworth's was selling, carefully padded the X-Ray's payload section with cotton wadding, poked some air-holes into the clear Mylar tubing, and shot the little guy over 1,000 feet into the air. Fortunately, it was a perfect flight, and once the rocket was recovered and the chameleon untangled from the cotton, he was quite alive and well (I presume that he was somewhat surprised by the experience though!). As a fully conscientious modern Tripoli member today, I don't launch biological payloads these days. Indeed, my little "chameleon in space" mission of 1966 was both the first and last time I ever did. But in retrospect, it seems like the roots of adventurous rocketry were with me and my friends from the start. Around the mid-1960's, my good friend Art Bower and I became acquainted with a number of other like-minded junior-high students who had begun their long association with experimental rocketry. I can well remember Art telling me, "You have to meet Glen Graham and Curt Hughes. We're starting a rocket club called 'Tripoli'" (yes, in those days we called him "Glen" rather than "Francis"). Within what seemed like a very short time, I was a member of this embryonic group of rocketeers, networked around the Pittsburgh area. I came to know others who shared our emerging passion for the sky: A.J. Reed, Ernie Scavincky, and Ed Onder among them. We were all early Tripolitans, and we shared more than just a hobby. From the start, we weren't merely a group of young guys who wanted to build rocket kits and fly them from local fields. We wanted more; we needed more. We wanted to explore the limits of this activity and push beyond those limits. This need to explore beyond the accepted realm of flying toy rockets, and into the uncharted territory of experimental "private citizen rocketry" was the essence of the original Tripoli spirit. That spirit influenced our personal journeys, leading us and our group towards destinations about which we could only guess. Within a few years, we learned much and evolved into our areas of personal preference. Most of us scratch-built our own rocket designs from an early stage. Our ideas grew more complex and ambitious as time progressed. Francis built everything from multi-staged ejection-impulse rockets to rocket powered airplanes. Curt and Art amassed large fleets of rockets of many sizes and layouts. A.J. and I worked on a number of unusual designs. I initiated a series of original designs I called the "KG-series" (a naming convention which seems a little embarrassingly self-serving now!). This series specialized in finless rockets with alternative forms of stabilization, and in massively staged rockets.
By 1968, the dream of higher altitudes and better overall performance than could be delivered by the dinky black powder motors available at the time had impelled Curt, Art, Ernie and Ed to develop their own zinc-sulfur and Caramel Candy fuels, which they used to power steel-hulled rockets of their own construction. Yes, while we were still teenage students, we began experimenting with amateur rockets. Some were more successful than others, but a number of them, like the Gloria Mundi and the Spartan flew very well indeed. Although this area was not my personal forte, I have always felt that our group's efforts were admirable, if only because we safely experimented with an activity that has some inherent danger, and achieved successes and endured failures without incidents of injury. In conjunction with the amateur rocketry path to higher altitudes, we pursued other methods to push the rocketry envelope. As more powerful motors became available, our background in rocket design helped us find ways to take advantage of them. My efforts, and those of A.J., focused on multiple staging for high altitude attempts. We found that conventionally staged rockets had limits; getting one to fly well that had over three stages was not very common. By 1969, I had struck on the idea of a "rack-rocket." This was a multi-stage rocket that had on open framework (the "rack") that allowed the rocket to remain in one piece, ejecting only its spent engines as stages. The first of these, the six-stage KG-4 Achilles flew successfully in early 1970. At the time, we estimated an apogee of one mile, and simulations of this rocket performed many years later do indicate that apogee of greater than 4,500 ft was certainly possible
Twenty thousand feet with amateur rockets, and one mile apogees with conventional engines was pretty heady stuff in those days; it showed that much more could be done with rocketry than was being achieved by a more conventional path. In effect, we were helping to sow the seeds of high-power rocketry, by not being content with low-power. An interesting aspect of Tripoli at that time was that our activities were not going unnoticed. The National Association of Rocketry was aware of our organization and its pioneering nature, but as the self-appointed keeper of the keys to civilian rocketry, they took a dim view of what we were doing. Clearly, the NAR was concerned about safety in this hobby, and their position in that concern was that only conventional approaches and smaller commercially available motors were safe. They didn't seem to understand that young people can be responsible experimenters, or that the future of civilian rocketry did not necessarily lie just with buying rocket kits and motors from the established manufacturers. As a result, they did not treat us well, to say the least! We can now look back with some amusement when we consider that their vision of the future was less accurate than our own, and that their eventual direction to support higher power rocketry would be strongly influenced by those of us who would evolve into the modern Tripoli. On the organizational side, the early Tripoli experienced some ebb and flow. We began with three prefectures: Irwin, East Pittsburgh, and North Braddock (hence the "Tri - Poli" name derivation). By the end of the 1960's, we had managed to network with other like-minded rocketeers from a larger scope than just the Pittsburgh area. At our height, we had members and prefectures in New York, Erie, Texas, and even Denmark. So it's safe to safe that Tripoli was a mildly national/international organization well before its incorporation in the mid-80's. There was a down side to this growth too. We became a little unwieldy and difficult to control for our as-yet politically inexperienced leadership. This led to a crisis which nearly foundered Tripoli: the election of a president whose ideals did not agree with those of the core membership, or indeed, with Tripoli's vision of safe experimentation. To be fair, I will not go into great detail except to say that by late 1969, the individual in question was able to rally enough support from his local prefecture to win a poorly supported presidential election (at this time, many of the core members of Tripoli were becoming a bit disconnected, often due to the pursuit of college-level education). The new president populated a new Tripoli Council with a majority of his admirers, who usually voted as a block, and passed a number of measures unpopular with the general membership. I was one of the minority council members who could not stop the tide of many of these measures. Worse, this leadership advocated experiments in areas which included amateur weaponry and manned rocketry flight. Those of us who were the more senior members of Tripoli found these dangerous directions to be repugnant, and likely to lead to injuries, fatalities, and of course, the death of our organization. By the beginning of 1970, many members had left in disgust, and the widespread prefectureship was crumbling. To avert a catastrophic situation, Francis Graham, A.J. Reed, and I worked diligently to find a way to wrest control from this leadership. This was accomplished by the three of us drafting a resolution which threatened to remove our (considerable) privately-held Tripoli assets, which included the logos and even the name, and reforming Tripoli with those assets and all members who cared to join. This would leave the existing president leading a nameless organization, comprised mostly of his relatively small group of cronies. Realizing he had been trumped, the president resigned, and Tripoli was re-organized. Apart from my rocketry activities, my role in helping to preserve Tripoli during this crisis is one of which I am most proud. While this episode was a setback, resulting in a considerable shrinking of the overall size of Tripoli, we quickly got back to work in experimental rocketry. As we entered the 1970's, my Achilles flew, as did the finless Celestes, and the Repulse, the latter powered by one of the newly available Flight Systems F-engines. Curt resumed efforts in a wide range of rocketry, including his excellent zinc-sulfur Spartan series. A.J. developed the rack-rocket concept further, and would ultimately be the first Tripolitan to widely market a series of rocket kits (Catksill Rockets) of original design. Francis, in character, began again to explore the limits - from lifting body rockets to Project Heliocom, Tripoli's farsighted program to put a small pellet into heliocentric orbit. For me, the mid-70's marked a time when my Tripoli presence slipped somewhat, as I pursued my college education and eventually embarked on a rocky first marriage. But I still designed rockets through that decade, including my dream rocket, the KG-15 Exeter. This was a three-stage, F-engined rack-rocket; at the time, I considered it the "ultimate rack." But it wouldn't be built until 1980, at which time I felt the need to rejuvenate myself and get back into actually constructing/flying some of the designs. The Exeter was launched in May 1981, with two FSI F-100-0s and one F7-9. It was a spectacular launch, with an apogee which we estimated at over 5,000 ft (modern wRASP simulations support a 5,400+ ft apogee). The following year, the four-stage KG-16 Ajax rack-rocket flew (into oblivion). I felt I was again in the forefront of the push to new vistas in rocketry. Also that same year, Curt and I took a trip to Medina, Ohio to attend a new rocket event called "LDRS I."
Curt was really getting into his stride at the first "Large and Dangerous Rocket Ships" launch. He captivated the crowd, and captured "most spectacular flight" honors with the awesome launch of his five-engine-cluster rocket, the Mongrel. A very long hunt for the rocket after it landed in seven-foot high corn stalks may have drained us physically, but not spiritually, especially when we finally located it intact. I can now appreciate, with the benefit of hindsight, what an important and exciting time we were entering. 1982 stands out as a watershed year. Starting at "KentCon," a conference of advanced rocketeers held at Kent State University in February, and continuing with LDRS I in August, Curt and I were able to meet many enthusiasts who would become important influences and pivotal players in the growth of advanced and high-power rocketry. It was at these events where we first met guys like Chris Pearson, Chuck Mund, Korey Kline, Scott Dixon, and others. Again, like-minded rocketeers were networking and building a larger pioneering group, much as had happened with the early Tripoli. The first LDRS was a building block for the modern Tripoli, and many of those who would forge the future of our organization first met and exchanged ideas there. There was no keeping Francis G. Graham away from LDRS II the following year. He joined Curt and I and continued the networking process, never ceasing to tell everyone about the now nearly 20-year old Tripoli. I took the Exeter along, but didn't fly it (damn me for being so stupid!). However, Korey Kline and Chris Pearson, inspected the rocket and thought it a neat concept. I was informed years later by Tom Blazanin that he and Korey did a fair amount of subsequent development/test work with rack rockets. However no matter what I did or did not fly, we were all excited by the direction rocketry was going. Composite G, H, and I-motors were becoming available, and rocket projects were becoming more complex and large. And now, many groups who had formerly been working in relative isolation became cognizant of each other (e.g. Tripoli, SNOAR, and the Lucerne group) and laid the groundwork for a cooperative national organization. Sadly for me, I was entering a critical and very trying phase of my life, when I had to re-invent myself professionally and re-boot my personal life. This meant that the months following LDRS II marked a turning point for me; I would still be in touch with Francis and Curt, and attended a few Ohio and Pittsburgh area launches. One of the more auspicious events, the "Z-1" launch of 1986 in Zelienople, PA, was of the last big launches I would attend for some time. Here I bought a Laser-LOC 1.5 kit from Ron Schultz, who was in the early stages of his "Lots of Crafts" (L.O.C.) business. Amazingly, I would not actually build the rocket until 1996!
It was in this mid-80's period that I would become acquainted with other Pittsburgh area rocketeers like Tom Blazanin and Mort Binstock who had been involved with progressive rocketry for many years, but who were only recently finding others with similar interests in Tripoli. As we all now know, Tom's efforts in conjunction with Francis and Curt would be of key importance in forming the new national Tripoli. So while my personal contributions were on hold for some time, the spirit of a growing group of forward-thinking rocketeers gained momentum. Tripoli would grow up and "go national" without me. I will rely on others to describe and comment on the vast organizational changes made during the period of 1986-96. Through these years, I was on the outside of Tripoli, vaguely aware of its growth but not very tuned in to the details. This was a period when I would still create a few new designs, and (for the first time) compile the whole KG-series in sketch form, in case I forgot something important! Also, the children were growing up - we built a few rocket kits here and there and flew them at Oak Hollow Park, North Huntingdon, where many historic Tripoli flights had taken place over the years. The kids found it entertaining, more or less, but none of them caught the rocket bug as I had in my youth. During this time, I always felt that I would return to more serious rocketry "as soon as I had more time." But of course, the years have a way of clicking by quickly as one gets older, and a decade elapsed before I realized it. One telephone call would dramatically change things for me again. Appropriately enough, it was a call from my old friend Art Bower, in early July, 1996. This time Art was asking if I wanted to join Francis, Curt, and him out in the country at the home of Tripoli friend Joe Galando for an afternoon of flying ultralight aircraft and recalling old times. Needless to say, I jumped at the chance. Although I didn't realize it right away, Art was once again pulling me into Tripoli. July 5, 1996 was a beautiful summer day, with a clear sky and light winds. Curt and I took to the air in Joe's Quicksilver ultralight. I snapped pictures and took my turn at the controls - the first time I had ever flown an aircraft. No better instructor could be found for this than Curt - the man who literally wrote the first book on ultralight aircraft instruction. Art also had an opportunity to fly with Curt, and Joe later took off for some solo buzzing of the corn fields nearby. We ended a magical reunion day with Francis guiding us all in star observations, as we gazed in the clear, cloudless night sky over rural Westmoreland County.
For me, this day grew into more than just a gathering of old friends. At one point before we rolled out the ultralight Curt showed me a pile of newsletters in Joe's hanger, created by none other than Francis Graham. They were recent issues of a publication called "Rocket Mail," a Tripoli Pittsburgh newsletter which was in limited local and national distribution. I found the issues I perused to be intriguing and extremely well written, if a little "cut-and-paste" in nature. When Francis arrived, I remarked about how much I liked the publication, and also suggested how it could easily be improved in format by using any number of PC desktop publishing packages. Francis eagerly asked if I would be interested in setting up the publication in such a medium, and I agreed. Only a few days later, he was arranging a meeting to pass on materials for me to use. Things moved fast, and for the July 22, 1996 issue of "Rocket Mail," I was the new co-editor. I of course began thinking that it was high time to re-join Tripoli (since my "life membership" back in the old pre-national Tripoli apparently didn't count!), and was about to ask Francis for the paperwork to re-up. Before I did, I received a kind letter (August 8, 1996) from Tripoli President Bruce Kelly who responded to my involvement with Rocket Mail. Discovering that I was one of the old-timers, Bruce asked if I wanted to re-join; in his letter he enclosed an enrollment form with my current TRA number. Of course, I needed no urging, and soon I was again a member of the modern version of the organization I had helped to advance for so many years. By early 1997, I had a couple of rockets ready to fly, and by September of that year, I achieved my Level 2 certification. The KG-series was revived, and modern versions of the KG-15 Exeter and the never-built KG-22 Bellerophon rack-rockets were under construction by the end of '97. Plans are now underway for my Level 3 project, an expanded version of another '80's design, the KG-18 Galahad. Strangely enough, I have never regarded myself as a "born again rocketeer," since I never thought I was "dead" to rocketry - I never really stopped designing rockets, even if I wasn't flying them!
There are now new challenges to face. Tripoli Pittsburgh, Prefecture #001 - where it all started - has slipped in membership and profile over the years. Many of the launch sites where we pursued our dreams of rocketry greatness have been gobbled up by land developers or have been transformed into parks where rocketry is not permitted. In general, the topography of western Pennsylvania has always been a little difficult for high-flying rockets, and thirty years of land development has not helped. But by the end of 1999, we had found a new high-power site, much more suitable than those used in recent years, although we feel we can still do better. We continue to search for better high power sites, and we continue the process of improving our launch equipment. We have been networking better to gain more members, and we are pooling our talents more effectively. And we have been working toward a new dream rocket, the KG-24 Terra Nova, with three stages and projected 100,000 ft capability. We hope that our Prefecture will again show the leadership that helped make Tripoli great.
Above: Design drawing of one version of the proposed KG-24 Terra Nova 100K ft. rocket.
After co-editing Rocket Mail for over three years, I was elected Prefect of the Tripoli Pittsburgh. And in July, 1999, I was elected to the TRA Board of Directors, assuming at the same time the office of Secretary and editorship of TRA's newsletter, Tripoli Report. I guess it's safe to say I have truly become involved again! When thinking back to the old days, it is with fond memories of being part of something important at a critical time of its existence. But although reveries of past glories have their place, I am very excited by the modern Tripoli and its philosophy of advocating responsible experimentation. We are an organization of rocketeers who not only enjoy a hobby, but also want to push the frontiers of civilian access to space. Indeed, we are now on the very cusp of this movement. And what is most remarkable to one who was with Tripoli in its infancy is the realization that this current spirit is exactly the same as that which gave life to our organization from the beginning. To see it preserved and expanded upon gives true satisfaction to those who were part of Tripoli's early history. And moreover, the dedication to preserving this spirit links us to our roots, ensuring that the history of Tripoli is also a part of Tripoli's future. All text, photographs, and graphics contained in this article are copyright © 2000 material of the Tripoli Rocketry Association, Pittsburgh Prefecture, and may not be downloaded or used without the express permission of the author. |
Left:
The three-stage F-engined KG-15 Exeter rack-rocket just before its successful
mile-high flight. Oak Hollow Park, May 3, 1981.
Right:
Ron Schultz and Ken Good (to Ron's right) discuss things with New Jersey
rocketeers at the Z-1 Launch of 1986. From "SNOAR News" of
July, 1986.
Left:
July 5, 1996 - a reunion of the Tripoli "Old Guard." From
left to right - Art Bower, Sarah Bower, Curt Hughes, Ken Good, Theresa
Graham, Francis Graham.
Left:
Ken Good's Merlin takes off on J-350 power. Dragon's Fire XIII, Jones
Farm, Charleroi, PA. October, 1999.