For a rocket to be stable the center of gravity must be forward of the
center of the aerodynamic forces (which has a name but it escapes me).

Note that luckily, as the engine burns, the tail of the rocket gets lighter
and stability improves.

However, this isn't always lucky: if the rocket starts off unstable and
wobbles all over and then turns stable as the engine lightens who knows
where it is pointing when it does go stable.

Bob Ammerman
RAm Systems
(contract development of high performance, high function, low-level
software)

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