I bought a cheap Estes launch kit for $22. It included the launch pad, ignition box and a simple kit called the Tazer. The Tazer is 17 inches (43.2cm) long with a 1 inch (25mm) diameter. I also purchased a few rocket motors (B-4-4 and B-6-4) and wadding. After building the rocket I drilled 3 1/16" (1.5mm) holes to vent the body were the payload would reside. There is no payload section so I folded the chute, attached the payload to the cleat at the bottom of the nose cone, and shoved the payload into the space between the cone and the chute. Launch day winds were light -- 2-5mph -- so I launched it true vertical. I pushed the button on the ignition box and lost sight of it immediately, wondering where it was until I heard the chute deploy and caught site of the parachute. It drifted about 500 feet from the launch site. I disarmed it upon recovery. Here's the page of the app showing the plot of altitude and the flight stats:

I expected that big discontinuity when the chute deployed (a bit early), but the pressure sensor recovered very quickly. Quickly enough that you can easily interpolate from the missing data. I also expected there to be a large step function when the Payload was ejected into ambient air. That didn't happen, which leads me to believe that the three small vent holes are adequate to allow reasonable tracking of pressure or altitude. Note also that there is a bit of a jog at burnout -- I did not expect that to be visible in the altitude data.
That flat spot at the transition from fast sampling to slow sampling looks like a bug. I think the Payload substituted the last fast sample data for the first slow sample data point. I'll take that issue up with Claude.
Acceleration Data:
I zoomed the data to just reflect the time from launch until chute deploy.

This looks to be first-order correct. The launch threshold was set for 3 samples above 3g (2g + 1g). That would be the 0 second point on the plot. So the actual ignition occurs in negative time, which the Payload captures.
I found the thrust curve of a B4 motor at ThrustCurve.org:

This shows the same impulse spike, though not as sharp, with a 2X longer burn time than what I get -- Payload data shows burnout occurred at 0.54s. Time from launch to deploy was nearly 4.5 seconds, so the delay is spot on.
I expected the rocket to enter free fall (zero gravity) earlier, but a rocket flight is not like a hand toss.
Summary:
Very good data for a first attempt. There is one issue to fix, but generally proves that recording method is sound. A B6-6 might be a good match for this Tazer model to get more height.
Bud Bennett
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