The GRETSS** (Groupe de Recherche et d'Etudes des Techniques Spatiales de
Strasbourg) is happy to welcome its
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You will discover in these few pages an exciting activity gathering hundreds of young
people in France (and more in Europe and in the rest of the world), the
high power rocketry. This activity is completely safe,
because it exists professional and reliable engines
freely available.
Fasten seat bells, make your eyes and ears ready and have a good take-off for this travel inside the history and the projects of on of the oldest French society always in activity, the GRETSS**
Groupe de Recherche et d'Etudes des Techniques Spatiales
de Strasbourg (Group for research & studies of space techniques of Strasbourg)
was created in 1977 by B-Bruno (Bruno Hébert, a father to us all) & some of
his friends. They had a common interest for space adventures & a desire to build
rockets. In a small building freely provided by ARES (Association des Résidents
de l'Esplanade Sud, a local community center) they met up every Saturday
afternoon to conceive & realize their rocketry projects
With limited means, but carried by an unstoppable enthusiasm, the club launched there first project PLEONASME 2 in 1979 at the Courtine military camp. Many other rockets have followed.
In the following years better facilities for building rockets were obtained (an oscilloscope & a metal lathe) & the projects became more and more ambitious. . As the older members of the club slowly gave way to newer members the club was renamed GRETSS**, the second star meaning "second generation".
To promote rocketry projects the club participates in the organization of summer courses, managed by ANSTJ,, which permit youths to build an experimental rocket in three weeks & so observe all steps in the development of a project. Teams of 4 - 6 persons can conceive and realize a project which culminates in the moment of launch (everything is over in less than 1 minute, the average flight time of an experimental rocket). Some of us went in Chinon, Nouans le fuselier, Spain, Morocco and even in Paraguay to have good time (no, sorry, to help young to discover what high power rocketry are).
In nearly 20 years of existence the club has launched 22 projects:
If some of these experimental rockets were very complex, we never breaking one fundamental rule; never take things too seriously! It is often around a table or a glass (at the end, around several bottles) that our projects are born.
As a member of ANSTJ (Association Nationale Science Technique Jeunesse - a national association to promote science & technology to the young) the club has access to rocket motors provided freely by the French space agency (CNES) following submission of a proposal for a project. These motors offer all guaranties of reliability & security, since the motor is prepared by a skilled pyrotechnician prior to launch.
The first team of the GRETSS* included:
In 7 years, they achieved 7 projects and started another terminated by the second team.
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1977 - |
1978 - 1979 |
1979 |
1979 - 1980 |
1980 - 1981 |
1980 - 1981 |
1881 - 1983 |
Because of studies, children, conscription or moving, almost all the members of the first team were gone to new adventures. Hopefully I have remembered all the team here:
As you will note, some of us (like me) don't participate in a lot of projects. Some never even made a project. But the most important is we are good friends with a lot of memories to share (and it's not finished).
In 10 years, we achieved 10 projects (to say nothing of 8 identical
rockets made by François). One of them, PLQMTM was
started by the first team
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1983 - 1984 |
1982 - 1985 |
1985 - 1986 |
1986 |
1987 |
| 10 years after, the team got older. Jeff if gone in 1986, Hélène in 1991, Fun in
1993 and Freluquet is studying in Paris (buying me my old GTI). But the others are always here, more or less faithful, more or less motivated but older and older. Add to them 3 new guys:
And you will have the |
During the realization of 
Laurent
Saint-Marcel (Lolo) joined us and made all alone its first mini rocket: CEPHEIDE
For this year, things are not clearly defined:
First of all, we are trying to understand the strange flight of . With the very efficient help of
all the youth section of the CNES, the reason of its strange behavior is now well known.
Michel has always a project in progress, a rocket glider powered by a Chamois. Unfortunately, some people are afraid by these kinds of rockets and they are not covered by the "cahier des charges" of the ANSTJ. It is therefore impossible to launch it.
was
not 100% successful. The parachute was not piloted and some of us want to relaunch it with
an automatic pilot for the beginning of the descent. But nothing is decided.
And Miloux starts a new rocket powered by a Chamois
| The GRETSS ** |
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gretss@multimania.com |
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GRETSS** c/o Simon Schulz 5, rue de Reims 67000 Strasbourg FRANCE |
You will find in this page some French and foreign WEB sites
about rocketry.
You can contact me and send remarks to: papysoft@multimania.com
[presentation] [1977-1983 : the GRETSS*] [1983 1993 : the GRETSS**] [1993 - 1996] [the future] [contact us] [another sites]
[ home] [French societies] [security] [engines] [1977 - 1983 projects] [1983 - 1993 projects] [Paral'bol 1993 - 1996] [Céphéide 1996] [another sites]
http://www.multimania.com/gretss/
