Airbourne Survellance Missile, Estes kit #0867

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bradycros said:
Added a few hundred more rivets. Almost ready for final paint.
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Very professional looking skin work. Did you invest in a few hundred really small clekos?

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A weathered Fat Scud.

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bradycros said:
I never knew something called a cleko was available until you posted it.
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Not a commonly stocked hardware store item. My dad built an aluminum-skinned kit plane some 30-odd years ago. Bet he had a thousand of them. Your faux riveting looks great... very keen attention to detail. The weathered look is a nice finish also.
 
SMR said:
Not a commonly stocked hardware store item. My dad built an aluminum-skinned kit plane some 30-odd years ago. Bet he had a thousand of them. Your faux riveting looks great... very keen attention to detail. The weathered look is a nice finish also.
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Thank you for taking the time to say that.
 
Yellow tipped Fat Scud.
 

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The summer heat is gone here. Man, that was one hot summer. Dry too, rain wise, but there was plenty of humidity.
I can go outside now without breaking a sweat just walking across the yard. I sanded down some ASM parts that were soaked with thin CA. You don't want CA dust floating around the inside of your house. I started with the I.D. of the motor tube.

You can see the inside surface is pretty rough in the first picture.

The second picture shows all the CA boogers have been sanded down.

AMS rocket 129.jpg

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bradycros said:
I sanded down some ASM parts that were soaked with thin CA. I started with the I.D. of the motor tube.
QUOTE]


Why or how, you maybe asking yourself, would soaking the I.D. of the motor tube with thin CA be worth the time and effort?

Because it will promote fire resistance within the motor tube.

To have a fire, three elements are required. Heat, air and fuel. Remove one of these elements and there will be no fire.

The ejection charge supplys the heat.
The tube is full of air.
The cardboard tube is the fuel.

Soaking the I.D. of the motor tube puts a barrier between the inside of the motor tube (fuel), the ejection charge (heat) and the space (air) in the tube.

In other words, the heat and air can't get to the fuel.
Fire proof? No.
Fire resistant? Yes.

The inside of the tube was sanded smooth so ejection residue can be easily swabed out.

This method could also be used in Low Power Rocketry. Soak the inside of the airframe with thin CA where the ejection blast fries the tube.

That's my theory and I'm stick'n to it.

How's that for a answer jimmy, eh?
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Here's an overview of where some of the ASM parts are at. Also some tools that helped get the project to its current stage.

A bambo scuewer (from Wal Mart, a bag of 'em are like a buck) with a q-tip taped on was used to apply the thin CA to the inside of the motor tube.

A dowel was glued to a piece of body tube. Sand paper was glued to the body tube. The whole thing is used to sand the CA inside of the motor tube.

Different sized body tubes cut into sanding blocks.

The chisle ended tool from the 4'pc spatula set was used to jam pack wood filler into the spirals. After the spirals dried, my finger was used to spread out more of the filler into the low spots on the body tube. The filler was then sanded down with the home grown sanding blocks.

Wood filler does not bring strength to the party. If/when the body tube flexes, guess what happens to the filler. Thin CA was applied with q-tips to really adhear the filler to the body tube.

AMS rocket 127.jpg
 
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Some good little tool ideas there chum ! I like the bodytube sanders you made ,very handy and the extended sander on a stick is one I`ve used myself for smoothing CA in motor tubes and when converting Aerotech rockets from S/U motors to reloads.Once you get rid of that steel spring and dig/grind out that thrust ring ,the sandpaper on the tube was very,very useful to get the engine tube smooth ,before and after adding CA.

And I do now use Q-tips to apply CA...who would have thought ?

Cheers

Paul T
 
Hey man ,why are the body tubes glossy ,is that from the CA ?

As you mentioned ,some time ago i was sanding my spirals and noticed that at times the filler would "pop" out of the grooves(I use Bondo spot filler)


Paul
 
I would be careful about soaking a tube in CA. I made an internal rotor heli for NARAM-50 by peeling a BT60 back to two layers and soaking the exterior in thin CA to get a nice smooth finish. It didn't fly all that great on the B-motor it was designed for, so it got thrown in the box of old models and forgotten about. NARAM-52 had D-HD on the event list, so I pulled out that old model and put it up on an Aerotech D10. About 100 feet up, confetti. After I retrieved the various parts, I did a post-mortem. The tube had buckled in a couple of places and shattered. I'm just guessing, but I think this was primarily due to the fact that CA becomes brittle over time. Granted we're talking about 2+ years here, but who doesn't want to keep their models that long?
 
Before and after shots.

The ring that goes on the lower body tube needed the inside diameter enlarged to acommendate the filler and CA. Sandpaper on a stick was taking forever, so I attacked it with a half round file. A pile of that black fiber centering ring material is alot tougher then you might think. Wonder if the weight difference is worth the time and effort to redo the ring with balsa. Since the motor is going to be on the high end of mid power, I really don't foresee several grams having much of an impact.

The sanding blocks knocked the boogers and gloss off the CA coverd body tubes. The CA helps to prevent filler from poping off the spirals. Now the body tubes have a flat satin appearance and are ready for primer, this is how/where a good paint job is started.

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Twelve bevels down, forty four more to go. :(
 

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You are a tenacious one aren`t you ! Are you sanding those buggers by hand ?
That`s the thing with rockets with that many fins......sandsandsandsandsandsandsandsandsandsandsandsandsandsandsandsandsandsandsandsand...............

Looks good though and it`s something you just can`t leave out.

paul
 
sodmeister said:
You are a tenacious one aren`t you ! Are you sanding those buggers by hand ?
That`s the thing with rockets with that many fins......sandsandsandsandsandsandsandsandsandsandsandsandsandsandsandsandsandsandsandsand...............

Looks good though and it`s something you just can`t leave out.

paul
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Yea, It's usually at this point in this type of build i start asking myself.. "why did I want to build this one again..." ugh!

Looks good tho... keep up the good work.
 
Third and last fin set beveled. Thank God. My finger tips are sore after making fifty six bevels on basswood.



sodmeister
Senior Member Join Date: 1st August 2009
Location: Winnipeg ,Manitoba.CANADA
Posts: 594
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You are a tenacious one aren`t you ! Are you sanding those buggers by hand ?
That`s the thing with rockets with that many fins......sandsandsandsandsandsandsandsandsandsand sandsandsandsandsandsandsandsandsandsand.......... .....

Looks good though and it`s something you just can`t leave out.

paul
 

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bradycros said:
Third and last fin set beveled. Thank God. My finger tips hurt after making fifty six bevels on basswood.



sodmeister
Senior Member Join Date: 1st August 2009
Location: Winnipeg ,Manitoba.CANADA
Posts: 594
-------------------------------------------------------------------------

You are a tenacious one aren`t you ! Are you sanding those buggers by hand ?
That`s the thing with rockets with that many fins......sandsandsandsandsandsandsandsandsandsand sandsandsandsandsandsandsandsandsandsand.......... .....

Looks good though and it`s something you just can`t leave out.

paul
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Hmmm... the number keeps growing, by the time he finishes it will be more like "yea, and I had to bevel like 200 fins..." :roll:
 
You have to agree....working with Basswood is a joy ,my favorite to work with ,plywood a close second.;)


Paull
 
Room for positive motor retention is really tight. Looks like I'll need a manufactured retainer instead of making my own.
Any suggestions?

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bradycros said:
Room for positive motor retention is really tight. Looks like I'll need a manufactured retainer instead of making my own.
Any suggestions?
Click to expand...

Test.. one two three... Test... This thing working? Hello?... Test, Test... WTF... Test...
 
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