First Estes Rockets

The Rocketry Forum

Help Support The Rocketry Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

gpoehlein

Well-Known Member
Joined
Jan 18, 2009
Messages
3,564
Reaction score
20
I was looking at the 1960 Estes Catalog on Ninfinger a couple days ago and noted that there were no actual rocket kits available yet - Just motors, parts and plans. This got me thinking: does anyone have a copy or access to the plan book that the catalog sells titled "Model Rocketry". This book says it contains the plans for three rockets: the Arrow-C, Sky Bird, and Orange Bullet. These were made using those early parts that Estes sold: BT-1, BT-2, PNC-1, PNC-2 and a plastic fin unit PF-1. The BT-1 was changed to the BT-40 (more or less), and the fin unit and nose cones also relabeled accordingly. I know the fin unit and one of the nose cones was originally sourced from a fireworks company.

Based on information in the 1963 catalog as well as the DOM model "Dirty Bird", I can get a pretty good idea of what these parts look like. It would be really cool to try to reproduce these parts using a 3D printer and revive these old early models. But seeing the plans for those three original models would be really helpful Yes, I know the Arrow-C and Orange Bullet were presented as DOM plans, but they were redesigned using newer parts such as BT-50 and BNC-50X for the Arrow-C. Also, actually looking at a good photo or having actual dimensions/measurements of the parts would be really helpful in recreating them. So I'd love to see if anyone still has an old rocket laying around that used one or more of these parts.

Anyone interested in resurrecting a really long dead bit of history here? To look at the 1960 catalog and see what I am referring to, here is the link to the catalog on Ninfingers: https://www.ninfinger.org/rockets/catalogs/estes60/60estcat.html
 
Back
Top