FLY HIGHER - A Scifi Novel [Updated Chapters]

[The Raging Sandwich]

32 minutes ago, Jonfliesgoats said:

What about sci-fi haikus?

Rise with fire and hope

Low budget rockets explode

Papa John's in Space

That's good! I'll have to work that into the book somehow. 

[The Raging Sandwich]

Sorry its been a while since a chapter was out. I have a three-day weekend away from school, it should probably be out sometime soon, though! 

[The Raging Sandwich]

Here's the link to Chapter 3 on Wattpad:

https://www.wattpad.com/333257511-fly-higher-a-scifi-novel-chapter-3

Anyone's who's willing to give it a test read before I put it on here is welcome to.

[The Raging Sandwich]

I'm rewriting a few small things throughout which will be implemented in the final draft. A couple things in this thread won't be in the finished book. Also, I'm working on Chapter 4 now, it's planned to be around 2 K words or so. Also, Chapter 3!

Spoiler

Michael and Casey were sitting in the Control Center the next week. They set it upon themselves that they would hang out at one of their houses on Saturdays. The early morning light was flooding through the shuttered windows, really setting the mood. Birds were chirping outside and they could smell the air through the open door. The occasional bug flew in but flew back out. Michael made sure none of them inserted itself into his ear.

            “Did you hear that school’s starting up again next week?” he said.

            “They finally fixed the rat problem?” she responded.

            “They actually fixed it two weeks ago, but they were so focused on them that they barely even planned anything for the year.”

            Casey moaned, saying, “I don’t want to go back there, it stank!”

            Michael laughed. “Whoever took those monstrous craps in the main floor bathroom really needs to cut it down on his burritos.” They both laughed. “But they should be telling us what classes we’re in in a couple days.”

            “Yeah, I hope you’re in a lot of my classes,” she said.

            “Like that’ll happen. Remember all the trouble we got in last year together and with Gavin and Evan?” Michael retorted.

            She smiled. “Yeah, I remember. Remember the parkour race we had? How you knocked over that stop sign and I tripped and busted my face on that railing?”

            “Yeah,” Michael laughed. “And that time Gavin threw that gum off the balcony and it landed in Mr. Ramirez’s hair?”

            “Oh, what about the time Mr. Morris caught you designing rockets in History and called you ‘Rocket Boy’ for the rest of the year?”

            “Yeah, I had a lot of nicknames last year. Think everyone will be calling me the same thing this year?” he asked.

            “Probably. Everyone called me ‘Shorty’ in 6^th and 7^th grade.”

            “Oh yeah, I remembered that! Evan called you that for a little bit, too, I think.”

            They sat there in silence for a moment, thinking, and listening to the birds chirp outside. “So, do you think we’ll have Field Day this year?” Casey asked.

            “Like we didn’t last year because of the literal two drops of rain all day that day?” Michael responded.

            Casey laughed, “Yeah. Hopefully we will.”

Later that night…

            Michael was in his room, drawing up another rocket engine design, this one a hybrid engine that ran on rubber and liquid nitrogen.

            Where am I going to get the money for all of this? he thought. I’ve already spent half of the life insurance money, and Grandad and Grandma has already spent the money directed towards them. It was awfully great of them to give most of it to me. They knew how much I wanted to do this. They even thought I could make a living out of it.

            The grocery store downtown lets kids work there for minimum wage when they’re 15, and I’m turning 15 in a couple months. That could work! He closed his notebook and opened the computer, going onto the store’s website.

The next morning...

            Michael’s grandparents were already downstairs in their church clothes, ready to go for the morning. Michael had just woken up and went downstairs. “Happy Reformation Day,” Grandad said to him.

            “I thought that’s tomorrow,” Michael replied.

            “It is, but today is Reformation Sunday,” Grandad explained.

            “Oh, ok,” he finished. “By the way, since I’m turning 15 in a couple months, I’m thinking of getting a job at Steve’s.”

            His grandparents stared at him blankly for a moment, looked at each other, then looked back at Michael. “What could you possibly need a job for?” Grandad asked.

            “Money,” Michael joked.

            “Money for what?” Grandad replied in all seriousness.

            “Hmm… My rockets, maybe a car in a couple years, flying lessons possibly.”

            Grandma looked back at whatever was on TV, but Grandad looked at him blankly again. He put his and up to his chin like he was thinking deeply. “Yeah, I don’t see why not,” he said while shrugging. “You’re going to have to get a part-time job, though, or else balancing between school and working would be a nightmare.”

            “Ok, cool! I looked on their website last night-”

            “Yeah, eat breakfast now and we’ll talk about this later. We need to leave in thirty minutes,” Grandad said cutting Michael off.

 

            Later, Michael sat at his desk, hunched over his notebook. Before he moved onto liquid fuel rockets, he’d have to at least experiment with hybrid rockets. All his life, he’d heard of rocket scientists all around the world who had launched hybrid rockets into space. Of course, they were all about 20 feet tall, which would be a huge step forward for Michael, maybe a little too big.

            What would probably be more realistic for him to manage would be one that could reach the lower stratosphere. But how would I do that? Michael thought. First off, I need a good fuel. What do existing hybrid rockets run on?

            He opened his computer, logged in, and went on the internet. He knew exactly how they worked, but the possibilities of propellants were endless. He typed hybrid rocket fuels in the search bar and hundreds of articles popped up. He clicked one that was about what fuels different companies and organizations were using for hybrid rockets.

            One solid fuel was hydroxyl-terminated polybutadiene (or HTPB for short) that could use high-test peroxide (HTP), nitrous-oxide, or just plain oxygen for oxidizers. He kept scrolling through, finding that nitrous-oxide could be used as oxidizer for just about anything. PVC, polypropylene, paraffin wax, polyurethane, polyethylene, and others could use nitrous-oxide as oxidizer. Another combination was paraffin wax and pure nitrogen. Plexiglas or acrylic and oxygen would work as well.

            He wrote all of these down in a chart with the solid fuels in one column and the oxidizers in another. I guess nitrous-oxide is the winner for oxidizer, Michael thought. But what could I use as fuel? He looked through the list for a fuel that could be easily obtainable. It’s either PVC, polyethylene, or polyurethane.

            I know I can easily get it, but where? He looked up where to find it. One website said gas supply companies. Good, there are a lot of those around here. He kept his computer open and went back to his notebook, only one blank page was left. It was cluttered with designs, drawings, orbital calculations, and gravity assist calculations.

            He began drawing a rough but meticulous design, not leaving out a single detail. I’m not going to start launching them right away. I need to start with small concept tests, he thought.

He drew a test rig to scale. Its maximum width would only be about an inch wide but 7 inches tall. It was a thick brass casing containing a small polyethylene tube. At the top of the brass casing there was a small compartment to ignite the oxidizer. A hose connected to the igniter lead to a pressurized tank of nitrous-oxide.

That’ll do. He checked his clock, it was almost 10:30. His eyes were growing heavy. I better go to sleep. He turned off his desk lamp that was alone in brightening the room. He got up, pushed the chair back under his desk, and crawled into bed, falling asleep in no time.

 

Michael opened the passenger-side door of Grandad’s truck and got in. The smell of smoke in its interior was finally gone after Grandad stopped smoking a month earlier. “Thanks for taking me,” Michael said.

“Taking you where?” Grandad replied. There was a brief silence until Grandad started laughing. He turned the keys and the engine roared and the truck rattled, but then stopped. “Hmm…”

Grandad got out of the truck. He went over to the front and gave it a swift kick, and it started up again. He smiled and got back in. “That’s a nuisance,” he said. They pulled out of the driveway and onto the main road. There wasn’t much traffic that day.

The truck soon pulled into the rough parking lot of the small warehouse. They got out and stepped onto the gravel. “You’re paying for this, right?” Grandad asked as they began to walk through the near-empty parking lot.

“Yeah, I brought fifty dollars.”

“Then you’re not getting much if that’s all you have.”

“Oh, I looked on their website last night. They sell 3 gallon tanks for ten dollars each.”

They reached the building and opened the door. A bell sounded and a voice said, “Oh, hey! Come in, come in!” A larger man stepped out from behind a shelf and greeted Grandad with a handshake, then Michael. “So what are you guys here for?” he said.

“We’re looking for some nitrous-oxide. I heard you had some?” Michael said.

“Oh, yes. We have lots of it! What kind do you want? One gallon, two-gallon, three-gallon tanks? If you don’t need them pressurized, we have unpressurized tanks as well.”

“Um, I think I’ll have the pressurized three-gallon.”

“Okay, follow me back here,” the man said. “My name is Jeff by the way.” Jeff lead the two around a shelf and to the back of the building. Numerous tanks lined the walls and others were cluttered anywhere around the room. “These are what you’re looking for,” Jeff said.

The tank was about 1 foot and 4 inches in width. It had a pressure gauge and a flow gauge on top of it. A valve and a port to connect a hose with joined them. “We can only sell three of those at a time,” Jeff explained. “It’s stupid, I know, but those are the rules. I don’t make the rules; I just follow them.”

“So someone could just come back here and easily get more?” asked Grandad.

“Yeah. We have a waiting limit where you have to wait a week before buying more of one gas. If it was up to me, I’d have anyone buying more sign something. But like I said, it’s stupid,” Jeff explained.

“So how much will it be for three of them?” Michael asked.

“Twelve dollars for each,” Jeff said.

“That’s a little more than it said on your website,” said Grandad.

“Yeah, we haven’t updated it in a while. We raised the prices a few months ago. You know how it is.”

“Well okay, then. I can manage that,” said Michael.

“Might I ask what you’re using this for?” asked Jeff as Michael pulled out his wallet.

Michael hesitated for a moment before answering, “Rockets.”

Jeff looked at him for a second. “Oh, okay! We have tons of people coming here for oxidizers. Are you making a hybrid rocket?”

“Yes, actually,” Michael answered.

“Cool! As you may know, there are lots of amateur rocket builders around here. I even get into it now and then. It’s pretty fun, actually! Do you have any experience with liquid-fuel engines?”

“A little bit. I’ve designed a few, but I’m working with hybrids first,” Michael explained.

“I only ask because only one person has come here that worked on liquid-fuel rockets. He came here once and I’ve never seen him again.”

“He never came back?” Grandad asked.

“No. I think he was arrested for launching it in a too urban area, he didn’t even have permission from the FAA. It crashed onto someone’s roof and punctured a hole into it. To avoid losing customers, we’ve actually set up a launch site a few miles from here. We recommend anyone building hybrids to launch from there or another remote location.” Jeff explained.

“We’ll keep that in mind,” said Grandad.

Michael took 40 dollars out of his wallet and handed them to Jeff, who in turn put them in his pocket. “Wait here, I’ll get your change, and we can load them up in your truck,” said Jeff. He went back towards the front of the store and came back less than a minute later. “Three-fifty is your change,” Jeff said as he put the money in Michael’s hand.

Jeff picked up two of the tanks and carried them on his shoulders. Michael took the other one because of his grandad’s bad back even though it was only about 10 pounds. They took it over to Grandad’s truck. “Do you just want me to put it in the back?” asked Jeff.

“Yes, please,” said Grandad. Jeff carefully put the two tanks in the trunk. Michael handed the last one to him and he put it in with the other ones.

“Thanks for coming, please come again soon!” said Jeff.

“Ok, you too!” said Grandad, and they got back into the truck. “Why did I say that?” he asked himself when he closed the door.

 

Michael tightened the vice grip on the rocket. It was small, only about an inch in diameter, but it was just a test rig. The combustion chamber was nearly 6 inches long. It was a polyethylene tube incased in a brass cover made from spare parts in the Barn.

At the top of the combustion chamber was an injector and an igniter. As the oxidizer is pumped in, the igniter would send flames into it, causing a stream of hot flame to enter the combustion chamber and react with the polyethylene and spew hot gasses out of the nozzle (a small hole at the bottom of the combustion chamber). Above the igniter was a tube leading to the tank of nitrous-oxide, the oxidizer.

The tank of nitrous-oxide was kept at a distance from the rig in case anything bad happened, like a small explosion or a fire. A fire extinguisher was on the work bench next to Michael and the oxidizer tank. A camera was pointing to the test rig.

Michael pressed a small red button on a trigger switch with a wire on it running to the igniter. A small flame erupted inside the igniter chamber. He then turned the valve on the oxidizer tank and a small hiss could be heard. The gas travelled through the hose to the igniter. A louder hiss could be heard once it reacted with the flames. A blue sizzling flame poked its way through the hole with a loud pop!

The flames began to grow longer and more narrow as they were pelted from the nozzle. The sound of the flames was intense, so Michael put on a pair of sound-blocking head phones, which blocked out the sound nicely. The polyethylene was slow burning; it took nearly 40 seconds for the flames to cease.

The sound began to die down once they did. As the flames grew smaller and smaller, it turned a bright orange before disappearing completely with a faint sizzle. The test was a success! Michael closed the oxidizer valve and took off the headphones. He had to go tell Grandad.

 

“So what is it you wanted to show me?” Casey said. Michael was leading her to the old barn. He opened the door. Casey saw the test rig ready for another test. “What is it?” she asked.

“It’s a test,” he answered.

“A test for what?”

“A hybrid rocket.” As Casey was about to open her mouth to ask something, Michael continued, “It’s sort of like a solid rocket and a liquid rocket mixed together. Hence, hybrid rocket.”

“I have so many questions,” she said jokingly.

“It has a solid fuel of polyethylene piping and an oxidizer of nitrous-oxide.”

“Laughing gas?”

“Yeah, that,” he answered. “The oxidizer there is pumped into that brass tube where it reacts with a flame and the pipe to create thrust.”

“Can it fly?” she asked.

“No, this is only a concept test. They have to be much larger to fly,” he explained. He led her over to the oxidizer tank. “Here, wear these,” he said, handing her a pair of headphones. She put them on and observed. Michael took the igniter switch and turned it on. Flames erupted inside the rocket.

He then opened the valve, letting the nitrous-oxide into the rocket. Once again, blue flames spewed out of the small nozzle. “Whoa!” Casey said, but the sound of the rocket and their headphones made it impossible to hear.

The rocket continued to propel itself to nowhere for several seconds. The thrust levels began to build up more and more. What Michael didn’t know was that he hadn’t tightened the vice grip enough to firmly clamp onto the rocket body. The rocket tilted up barely, but it eventually got so great that it slipped out of the grip and onto the floor.

It clashed to the floor with a loud clang, loud enough for them to hear through their headphones. It moved across the floor away from them and fast speeds until it made the tank of nitrous oxide fall over as the length of the hose ran out. It slowed at the weight of the tank until it ran out of the polyethylene fuel.

The flame sizzled out, leaving a line of black scorch across the floor. They both took off their headphones and looked at it with no words to say. Eventually, Michael said, “It worked the first time, I swear."

 

Edited February 24, 2017 by The Raging Sandwich

[The Raging Sandwich]

As the thread name suggests, I made some small changes to the chapters. Make sure you go back through and read them, I made it focusing more on the the rocket program.

[The Raging Sandwich]

Chapter 4!

Spoiler

To be able to actually use the technology practically, several more concept tests were needed. Over the weeks, Michael conducted 5 more tests with the first rig. After they all were successful, it was time to scale up.

            The polyethylene tubing was good for small-scale concept tests, but that was about it. Acrylic tubing was the way to go. He got another notebook for his designs and started drawing out another test rig. This one was bigger than the first, 1.5 inches in diameter and 1 foot tall.

            The body itself was the acrylic tube with a half-inch wide hole through the middle. It had a pipe coming out the top of it which lead to the tank of pressurized nitrous-oxide. The acrylic would burn inside out, and as long as the hole inside didn’t burn to the end of the tube it would be fine. It would be started by a fuse being lit inside the hole.

            The special thing about this test was that it could be modified for an actual rocket. It would be a small and crude rocket, but it would work. It would actually be smaller than the Hornet Mk2.

             He had all the materials to build this except for the acrylic tube. He could get that at the department store in the morning.

Two days later

            After a few difficulties, the new test rig for the hybrid rocket was finished. It was ready to test. If successful, the engine plume should be larger and the noise much louder. The tank of nitrous-oxide was hooked up and the rig was clamped to the vice grip.

            Michael activated the igniter. A small flame started up inside the test rig. He then activated the pump connected to the tank, letting the nitrous-oxide flow through the tube and to the igniter. The flowing gas reacted with the flame and was propelled into the acrylic. Those two then reacted and sent a plume of blue flame out the end of the rocket.

            The sound was intense, expectantly a lot louder than that of the previous test rig. Michael adjusted his headphones, but that didn’t help. The flames were intensely bright, so he put on his welding mask. He could see little, but the flames were still noticeable.

            The acrylic tube was burning inside out. The patterns of the flames looked like the white noise on TVs. Once the flames reached the outside of the tube, it would be time to shut off the nitrous-oxide tank.

            It took about a minute for the acrylic to be near-burned out completely. Once less than a centimeter of acrylic was left, Michael closed the valve to the pump on the tank. The gas stopped flowing and the flames dissipated. The smoldering acrylic inside the tube cooled down as well.

            He took off the mask and the headphones and set them down on the table. Now that he could see better, a small pillar of smoke was rising from the end of the tube. A small puff of the fire extinguisher made the smoke billow away. It probably would’ve went out on its own, Michael thought. The test was successful.

 

            Michael sat at his desk later that night hunched over his design notebook. He was scribbling down a design of a rocket that utilized the engine design he tested. He had designed several hybrid rockets, but none with that kind of engine design.

            First off, the acrylic tube had to be taller. The width would be fine, as long as the rocket fit over it. Next that would have to be modified was the nitrous-oxide tank. The tank that he already had was much wider than the acrylic tubing. He could make a new tank from scratch with a smaller valve and pump system. To actually be able to include the feed-tube inside the hull, the tank would have to be put upside-down.

            The nitrous-oxide would have to be pressurized as well. The store-bought tanks already came pressurized, ones made from scratch don’t. Probably the easiest way to pressurize it is to use a bicycle pump. Before building the homemade tank into the actual rocket, he would have to attach the pump to the tank to hand-pressurize it.

            Another way to have it pressurized was to not pressurize the tank itself, but have the fuel pressurized as it flows out of the tank. To have that done, a turbopump would be needed. However, a turbopump would be too bulky to include in the rocket. Plus, a turbopump requires its own fuel to run.

            The way a turbopump would work is that some sort of gas would be pumped into a turbine and start it spinning. The turbine would be connected to another turbine: the oxidizer pump. But, adding a whole other tank to the rocket would just weigh it down and the hand-pump method would be so much easier to manage and do. As an addition, it would be cheaper. Turbopumps would probably have to wait for liquid-fuel rocket engines.

            He was torn whether or not to put a camera platform on it or not. There was no definite way to measure how much thrust the engine provided based off of the previous test to see if it would actually be able to lift the additional weight of a camera platform or not. This version would not include one. Further tests would provide a definite answer to if it could carry one or not.

            Next came the recovery system. This rocket would more than likely use aluminum as its main material like the Cougar Mk 7. Aluminum is, of course, much heavier than cardboard, but not necessarily any other materials. He didn’t have a lot of aluminum left, so it would actually be wise to get more material.

            Many hybrid rockets use carbon fiber tubing as the main hull material and it is much cheaper and lighter than aluminum. That way, a parachute wouldn’t have to be as large to safely bring a rocket safely back to the ground. But it would still have to be fairly large as the tank of nitrous-oxide might provide some excess weight.

            A remote-deployment of the parachute would be needed like on the Cougar Mk 7. No explosive charges would deploy the parachute like on early models of the Cougar rocket. Depending on if there is a camera platform or not, the rocket would either come down in one or two pieces. This one would come down in one piece like a huge model rocket. Now that a design was done, all that was left to do was build it.

            It was getting late and he was getting tired. Every few seconds, it seemed like his eyes would grow heavy. He closed his notebook, put the pencil in his pencil cup, and closed the computer he was using to listen to music. He didn’t bother to change into any pajamas; he just rolled under his covers and fell asleep.

 

Four Days Later

            It was the last day before school started. Like they hoped, Michael and Casey shared a couple classes together. Before he had to spend most of his day at school again, he wanted to get in as much work as he could on the hybrid rocket, which he had dubbed the Starbound just before falling asleep the previous night. He was reading a book from 1964 about a group of highschool kids that built their own rocket called the Starbound and got the idea.

            As he opened the door outside, he saw the old town mail car deliver some letters to their mailbox and drove off. To save his grandad the time, he went to go get the mail for him. He opened up the box and noticed a larger letter that stood out from the rest. It was stamped with the FAA seal.

            This isn’t good, he thought. Normally, they contacted the Baers through E-mail, but almost never by mail. Under the seal was stamped URGENT. He opened it up as he walked back to the house. He pulled out the letter inside which was folded. It was hard to read the writing on it so he held it up towards the Sun for light.

            It read:

            To Arthur Baer,

            As of August 30 of this year, your official license for launching off rockets will be expired. Until you get it renewed, any allowance of launches will be terminated. You can renew your license any time from August 31 of this year to October 18 of this year, but will not go into effect until October 20 of this year. Any attempt at renewing after the deadline will we result in the need of getting an entirely new license.

            Until then, you may continue production of rockets following our safety guidelines but no launches will be permitted.

            Thank you for your cooperation.

            Underneath the text was a hand-stamped FAA seal.

            This is just great, Michael thought. “This is just great!” he said aloud this time. He didn’t have any hint of anger in his voice, but inside he was steamed. He stormed up to the house to show his grandad. He set the other envelopes on the table and handed him the letter from the FAA.

            He read it over blankly. Michael thought he read it again, but he wasn’t sure as Grandpa Baer was a slow reader. “Hmm. Sorry Skipper. We’ll get it renewed next Saturday.” Grandpa Baer took the other envelopes from the table and went into the other room with them.

 

            Michael would be going to bed early that night as the next day would be the first day of school. He would be going into the 10^th Grade this year. He had all the supplies he needed. It was a pain for him to organize it the way his teachers wanted it. It seemed like every one of them wanted everything in a specific way, like how his World History teacher specified that he had to have dividers with only one pocket, not two.

            Grandpa Baer actually got the dividers with two pockets as protest, and Michael was okay with it, as long as it didn’t get him into any trouble. He wasn’t sure whether that would happen or not, because the World History teacher was known to be unreasonably strict when it came to tidiness, even when it wasn’t his things.

            He heard that one time the teacher nagged on to a kid (whose name was Jerry) in a wheelchair for having a sign on the back that read “I can’t stand being in a wheelchair,” even though the kid was the one that put it on there. Ever since, Jerry pulled subtle pranks on the teacher, such as tilting picture frames by a few degrees or pulling down his desk chair to as low as it would go.

            Other teachers wanted students to sign up for their after-school clubs, sometimes even forcing certain students to join. Luckily, he wasn’t one of them. They were all unnecessary things, like the English class’ Literary Club, or the Math Team. Michael would’ve joined the Math Team as they have special classes apart from the regular math classes, but he would have to go to competitions for it.

            He just hoped a teacher wouldn’t pull something like a quiz on the first day. Everyone hated it when teachers did that, especially since there was no reason for it. Another thing he hoped the teachers wouldn’t do was a “get to know your classmates” sort of thing, even though they all knew each other since 7^th Grade.

            Before he went to bed, he started thinking.

What would happen if I launched something without the FAA’s permission? I know it would be illegal, but how would they find out? It’s not like they have cameras watching around the farm. Well, it would be easy to find out. Someone would definitely notice a large tube with fins falling to the ground by a huge parachute, possibly in multiple fiery pieces.

But what if they caught me doing it? Would they arrest me? Take away my license maybe? If that happened, I probably wouldn’t be able to get it back. But wait, technically it’s Grandad Baer’s license; I’m not the one who actually owns it. Would they allow me to get a new one? Probably not.

But what if everything went perfectly? A perfect launch, no planes overhead… Oh wait, we’re around Houston. That’s impossible. But let’s just say there aren’t any… A perfect flight, and the rocket is recovered outside of town where nobody can find it. Surely though, people would see it going up and down.

Would they let me do static launches? Possibly not. Their safety guidelines say that you can’t do any sort of firing – an actual launch or a static test – when your license is either revoked or expired. But then again, how would they find out if I did a static test? Especially if its inside? It’s against the guidelines to do it inside, but still, how would they find out? Plus, I’ve done a bunch of static tests inside the barn!

It was getting late. He had to go to sleep. He wanted to be up bright and early, especially since he wanted to make an impression on Casey.

Should I start showing interest? he thought. Sure, why not?