Well, it's been a tough week. The balloons and parachute came in over the weekend, so I was very excited at the start. Then, I spent $50 on an AT&T SIM card only to find out that they don't support CSD calls (it's like a fax machine or a dial-up modem). I borrowed two T-mobile SIM cards to test them for CSD calls and it worked! I quickly went to the T-mobile store and tried to buy two prepaid cards, but this store locks their prepaid cards in a time-lock vault after 5pm. I showed up bright and early the next morning to buy the cards and when I went to test them they didn't actually get activated. Since I'll never be able to get to the store before 5pm before my test launch on Saturday I had to get a refund and go shopping elsewhere. I found another T-mobile store and ended up paying twice as much for the SIM cards as the first store. I was also told that CSD calls would definitely work. By this time it should be no surprise to you that CSD calls do not work with T-mobile prepaid SIM cards. Tomorrow I am going to attempt to get the SIM cards converted into a one month family plan, wish me luck!
Since I don't want to leave you with a bad taste in your mouth (it should be about poopy flavored lollie pop by now), I'm going to attach the balloon and parachute photos below. You'll notice that the parachute is not the normal circular shape. The "x-form" parachute is used by high powered amateur rockets because it reduces the drifting caused by wind. That sounds like a brilliant thing to use on this project. We'll see how it turns out in about two weeks!
6' in diameter!!! 1200 gram balloon from Kaymont
Inlet is about 2.5" in diameter and very stiff
60" x-form parachute from Top Flight Recovery (purchased from Performance Hobbies)
60" chute folds to about 4"x2"
Dismantled Argus Bean camera
Deeper inside
All back together with wires soldered across the shutter switch so I can virtually snap photos with the microcontroller.
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