Update: a small change of plans

Location

You know how I posted about Bend, Oregon being our launch site? Yeah, well that's changed (possibly). Recent research has yielded a new possible site which is better than Bend. And although it does have some obstacles (only a few rivers and a nuclear cleanup site, no big deal), the terrain is much more ideal (mostly farmland, i.e. easy retrieval) and the cell coverage is much, much, much better. The area which we are looking at is South Central Washington, landing hopefully near Kennewick. And yes, that does mean that the nuclear site to which I am referring is Hanford, the one which manufactured the plutonium for the bomb detonated in Nagasaki. It is also the most contaminated nuclear site in the nation (yeah, that may be a problem). It's okay, though, so long as we land in the farmland around the site and not in the site. I do not want to have to talk to federal officials about why I have landed a craft in their nuclear site. 

Where we want to land 

Where we absolutely do not want to land

The fact that there is a federal site may also explain why a bunch of farmers can get 4G cell coverage. Anyways, the coverage here is superior to that in Bend, which is necessary for recovery. The launch site is also quite a bit closer to Portland as well. 

A few extra expenses

We are going to have to buy some more pieces of equipment which we hadn't originally planned on buying. One is a GoPro Battery BacPac (their spelling, not mine) which will get us enough battery life to last the whole journey. On it's own, the stock battery will last about 2 hrs (estimated length of flight: 2 hrs 15 min). The BacPac should double the battery capacity, however it may cost around $50. We also need to purchase a 32GB Sd card which adds about $25 but can record 4 hrs of HD video. Another expense we had not thought of is a gas pressure regulator for the helium. It is highly recommended by near space professionals that one is used in order to prevent popping of the balloon. I do not know yet the expense of this one, however I did see an absurdly priced regulator and filling tube for $60. I will hopefully be able to borrow or rent one. On a more positive note, I was able to find a parachute for only $25 which is less than I planned on spending. Oh, and we decided to only buy one balloon. If it pops, we purchase another and postpone for a week. Peace of mind isn't quite worth $80.

Progress update

Not much has changed since the last post. However, we plan on completing the capsule this week after ordering parts. If we are actually able to get some work done this week, we'll have another update on the blog soon. As always, if you have any comments, questions, or anything else you want to tell us, don't hesitate to email us at nearspace13@gmail.com (seriously, I created an email solely for this purpose and the inbox is quite empty) Be sure to check back on the blog frequently, more stuff will be happening as the launch draws ever closer.