The story behind the name is pretty simple; this is the first High Power rocket I built, and I needed to get it ready for the next launch. Well, I had taken my time and did a good job on the construction (as proven later) but I hadn't painted it. And while I'm not a stickler for appearances on my rockets, I did want a bright color on the rocket so I could see it for recovery.

So, a couple of coats of cheap red spray paint with no primer later, I had a highly visible - but rather ugly - rocket. Not wishing to spend the time and effort to fix the paint job, and firmly opposed to the idea of changing it later, I decided that this was as good as it would get - and out came the permanent Sharpie marker, and the acronym "WYSIWYG" appeared on the side. "What You See Is What You Get" definitely fits this rocket. <G>

For all of that, this is one tough, sturdy rocket. It's flown more than any other rocket in my fleet, and several more flights than the average high power rocket manages in its career - and it's still going strong. One flight, in May of 2002, proved the strength of this rocket in particular.

At the 2002 Fire in the Sky launch at Touchet, Washington, I launched the WYSIWYG as part of a three-way drag race with two other PML Ios. We were all flying on single-use Aerotech F25 motors. The WYSIWYG lit promptly, took off well, and arced over a few hundred feet up... very pretty flight... except it kept arcing over... and arcing over... and then it wasn't arcing, it was just going down... thump. A cloud of steam rose from the impact site in a freshly irrigated wheat field.

It took a lot of work to find the rocket - buried all but the last six inches of its length in the field - but when I did, there was remarkably little damage. Some of the paint on the nose was scrubbed off (and, as I was informed, you don't remove the battle scars unless they require repair <grin>) and the nose cone had to be reattached to the shock cord - but the rocket flew again, and again, and again...

As usual, a few pictures, all post- impact incident.

The WYSIWYG, standing on its tail at BMR's launch site in Dayton, Washington.

Prepped and ready for flight on an Aerotech G40 reload.

Launch! Very nice shot of the motor's flame, too.

There's very little to say about the construction. The PML kits are very nice for new flyers, they go together easily and without any problems. Every piece is well machined and precision-cut, I didn't have to adjust a single piece to make it fit where it was supposed to go. The only modification I made was to throw away the piston.

Piston ejection systems, something PML is very fond of, use a small cylinder inside the airframe as part of the ejection system. The ejection charge pushes the piston up the tube, which forces the parachute and shock cord out.

In theory, this is a very nice system. However, I've never had an ejection problem caused by the ejection charge not being able to force out the parachute, and I can foresee problems with a piston system jamming in the airframe, so it's a bit of insurance that I'm more comfortable flying without. Your mileage may vary.