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I will never win any beauty contests with my birds, but every time I put one in a tree or a pond or a huge manure pile, I am so glad I didn't spend 400+ hours on the finishing. :wink:
 
I gotta tell you, seeing that wrench frightens me. I suppose he also has the metric pliers to go with it......

Phil L.
 
If you look closely, you will see that Crescent has, apparently, cracked the code and produced a universal adjustable wrench! That one is a 10" AND 29mm. I am glad that they have started making these because it was always a pain having to switch between my standard and metric adjustable in the middle of a job
 
If you look closely, you will see that Crescent has, apparently, cracked the code and produced a universal adjustable wrench! That one is a 10" AND 29mm. I am glad that they have started making these because it was always a pain having to switch between my standard and metric adjustable in the middle of a job

Almost makes you want to carry a full set of metrics and standards and just throw the adjustables away!
 
Am I the only one who saw the thread title and immediately thought:

"and gone!!" from History of the World Part 1?
 
...Oh, and I have concluded that Nathan's rockets are all CGI renders. Four hours of wet-sanding, ha!

Notice that I only post pictures of my rockets when they are new. If you saw what they looked like after a few flights you would discover that they are, in fact, real.
 
Notice that I only post pictures of my rockets when they are new. If you saw what they looked like after a few flights you would discover that they are, in fact, real.

I still haven't totally wrapped my head around the weird but awesome masochism/fatalism that pervades this hobby. Allegedly right-minded people (including myself) spend a great deal of time trying (or, in your case, succeeding ;)) to achieve perfect models, with complete acceptance that there is a very real possibility they will either get (a) messed up, or (b) lost or totaled. People on this forum recount all the time, with great non-chalance, about gorgeous models they lost within the first flight or three. I hope to achieve this zen state of mind before I inevitably lose something I really spent time on. In the meantime, I can totally respect those who don't slave over their finishes (or even fly naked) for this very reason.

Anyway, that's part of what I love about all this hobby and the people who participate. All of which for some reason reminds me of this joke. The version I heard was much longer (and probably funnier :)), but this gets the point across:

A miserly man lived alone. His aversion to spending money was extreme. At night, he would read by the moonlight to save the cost of electricity or even candles, until his eyes were so bad that he could no longer read at all. He foraged for his food, subsisting on bitter weeds with the occasional wild rodent he would catch with his bare hands, cooked over a fire made from firewood he found loose in the forest behind his house. To save the cost of toilet paper he would use leaves, or sometimes steal newspapers from his neighbors' recycling piles.

Year after year he lived like this, relentlessly saving every fraction of a penny he could, spending not a single one on himself or anyone else.

On his 70th birthday, he took all the money he had saved, every last penny, from under his bed, and asked his friend to take him to the race track. He went to the ticket window and put all the money on horse #1 to win in the first race.

When the horse came in last, he said to his friend: "Oh well, easy come, easy go."
 
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Funny. Reminds me of an early Who song, Silas Tingy, about a miser. He carries all his money in a steel box, until one day he is almost robbed. The final verse goes:

He bought a safe to put his box in
And a house to put his safe in
And a great big dog to guard by the front door.

And his face was kind of funny
As he counted up his money,
And he realized he hadn't any more. :smile:
 
I still haven't totally wrapped my head around the weird but awesome masochism/fatalism that pervades this hobby. Allegedly right-minded people (including myself) spend a great deal of time trying (or, in your case, succeeding ;)) to achieve perfect models, with complete acceptance that there is a very real possibility they will either get (a) messed up, or (b) lost or totaled. People on this forum recount all the time, with great non-chalance, about gorgeous models they lost within the first flight or three. I hope to achieve this zen state of mind before I inevitably lose something I really spent time on. In the meantime, I can totally respect those who don't slave over their finishes (or even fly naked) for this very reason...

I guess it comes down to the basic question of what is it that you enjoy about rocketry. One of the things I enjoy is pushing myself to build the best rockets that I'm capable of building and that includes the paint jobs.

Like everyone, I hate it when a rocket that took months to build and paint gets damaged or lost, but I don't expect them to look perfect after being flown either. Part of the fun is being careful to do everything right when flying them to minimize the chance of problems. I have crashed or lost a lot of rockets but I don't make the same mistake twice.

...Now excuse me while I figure out how to hang my rocket from the ceiling so I can apply floor polish to it.

NOOOO, not floor polish!!! Would you put floor polish on your car?
 
I guess it comes down to the basic question of what is it that you enjoy about rocketry. One of the things I enjoy is pushing myself to build the best rockets that I'm capable of building and that includes the paint jobs.

I do too, up to a point. :)

NOOOO, not floor polish!!! Would you put floor polish on your car?

No love for Future? This'll be my first experience with it, will see how it goes.
 
My local Family Dollar quit carrying acrylic floor wax (my best Future alternative). Instead of searching far and wide for another source, I did a bit of research and recently moved to Lundmark High-Gloss Floor Wax. Definitely has more solids than Future and, although not as rock hard as the acrylic polymer I put on my acid stained concrete floor, two coats I have put on my 6" dia. X-15 seem much harder than Future which is easily scuffed off. Before using, I tested it and you can remove the finish with full strength ammonia (whereas you need to use xylene on my basement acrylic which is of course disastrous to paint).

From the Ether...
 
My local Family Dollar quit carrying acrylic floor wax (my best Future alternative). Instead of searching far and wide for another source, I did a bit of research and recently moved to Lundmark High-Gloss Floor Wax. Definitely has more solids than Future and, although not as rock hard as the acrylic polymer I put on my acid stained concrete floor, two coats I have put on my 6" dia. X-15 seem much harder than Future which is easily scuffed off.
How does it apply compared to Future? Is it a thicker liquid, does it self-level as well, etc? Are you applying it with a foam brush or some type of spray?

(sure never expected this thread to get necro'ed into something productive... :))
 
If you were a ham radio operator you might know about grid squares and might even chase them.
 
How does it apply compared to Future? Is it a thicker liquid, does it self-level as well, etc? Are you applying it with a foam brush or some type of spray?

(sure never expected this thread to get necro'ed into something productive... :))
It is thicker, but still low viscosity. Seems to work very similar to Future. In my case this weekend I poured it in a spray bottle, about 12 oz. (one 32 oz bottle costs like $8.50 on Amazon) and used that to douse the rocket (it is pretty big), then used a lint-free microfiber cloth to wipe off the excess and assure complete coverage. Resulted in zero bubbles and only minimal streaks which occurred when I let parts of the cloth get too dry, which I easily adjusted to on the second coat.

My application was a bit different as I wanted to achieve a blue hue over the flat black base so I used a few squirts of Createx Transparent Brite Blue in the mix plus I added, I'd say a half ounce, of Simple Green via a dropper to reduce surface tension over the flat paint. Going over gloss paint and only looking for a clear protective coat, it is good to go out of the bottle.

From the Ether...
 
Future has this flowery smell. This stuff has almost no smell.

From the Ether...
 
It is thicker, but still low viscosity. Seems to work very similar to Future. In my case this weekend I poured it in a spray bottle, about 12 oz. (one 32 oz bottle costs like $8.50 on Amazon) and used that to douse the rocket (it is pretty big), then used a lint-free microfiber cloth to wipe off the excess and assure complete coverage. Resulted in zero bubbles and only minimal streaks which occurred when I let parts of the cloth get too dry, which I easily adjusted to on the second coat.

My application was a bit different as I wanted to achieve a blue hue over the flat black base so I used a few squirts of Createx Transparent Brite Blue in the mix plus I added, I'd say a half ounce, of Simple Green via a dropper to reduce surface tension over the flat paint. Going over gloss paint and only looking for a clear protective coat, it is good to go out of the bottle.

From the Ether...
Thanks for excellent details on this product. I will eventually try it out. I like Future but always wished for a harder set. Maybe this is better!

Also a challenge with future is that once in a while it slightly dissolves my acrylic (Createx/Wicked etc) airbrush paints, blurring the lines.

Interesting that it worked to put a squirt of Createx into the Polish. I tried with a Wicked color and Future; they didn't mix well in that one attempt.

I love the fruity future smell...
 
This thread was a really fun read..

My wife is an electrician.
She told me what they do to first year apprentices on the job.
In a room in an office building there were drop in fluorescent fixtures that took F40 U lamps..
They stashed a box of U lamps in the drop ceiling.
They sent the apprentice in the room to change a bad lamp.
They gave him a whole case of F40 straight tubes and a 3/4" EMT bender..
When he had a difficult time they'd ask him to step out for a minute and get a U lamp down from in the ceiling,
close the ceiling tile, ask him to come back in, and say, see,, it's really not that hard to bend these,, it just takes a bit of a touch..
Then they'd leave him alone again and come back later and see how he did..

Teddy
 
My local Family Dollar quit carrying acrylic floor wax (my best Future alternative). Instead of searching far and wide for another source, I did a bit of research and recently moved to Lundmark High-Gloss Floor Wax. Definitely has more solids than Future and, although not as rock hard as the acrylic polymer I put on my acid stained concrete floor, two coats I have put on my 6" dia. X-15 seem much harder than Future which is easily scuffed off. Before using, I tested it and you can remove the finish with full strength ammonia (whereas you need to use xylene on my basement acrylic which is of course disastrous to paint).

From the Ether...
My bottle of this "Super Gloss Floor Wax" (sic, it's not a wax) is due to arrive today. I will coat a rocket this weekend with it and post results in the Techniques forum.
 
My bottle of this "Super Gloss Floor Wax" (sic, it's not a wax) is due to arrive today. I will coat a rocket this weekend with it and post results in the Techniques forum.
I'm loving my X-15 right now. Decals will go on later this week, then a final (one or two) coats of clear acrylic to seal it up.

From the Ether...
 
My local Family Dollar quit carrying acrylic floor wax (my best Future alternative). Instead of searching far and wide for another source, I did a bit of research and recently moved to Lundmark High-Gloss Floor Wax. Definitely has more solids than Future and, although not as rock hard as the acrylic polymer I put on my acid stained concrete floor, two coats I have put on my 6" dia. X-15 seem much harder than Future which is easily scuffed off. Before using, I tested it and you can remove the finish with full strength ammonia (whereas you need to use xylene on my basement acrylic which is of course disastrous to paint).

From the Ether...

Is this the one?

LundmarkSuperGloss.jpg

Mine came and I'm testing it out. It appears very milky out of the bottle. Seems very low viscosity, less than future. I put some on a piece of foamcore, next to a similar bit of Pledge with Future. Then I let it dry and it doesn't seem glossy compared to the Future. I treated a small piece of my latest rocket with it; it's drying now. It does not look like Future that coats fairly thickly, viscously, then flows out as it dries/cures. The Lundmark was so thin that only a little bit coated the rocket while the rest dripped off.

We'll see how a second coat works out. I'm just doing a section of fin can on a BT50 rocket.
 
I tried the Future floor polish, but the instant I turned on the floor buffer that rocket went straight through a window and I never saw it again.
 
A guy I knew at school was an apprentice aircraft mechanic back in the early 80's. He was once sent to the Store for a hostess mounting bracket. He didn't figure it out till later :).
 
Rats. How did they find out about #noobrocketfail ??? The illuminati must now hatch a new disinformation campaign...

I am #noobrocketfail... Without needing a hashtag. And I uploaded to TRF rather than take pride in my work... LOOOOOOOOLLLLLLLLLL.....
Everyone was YOU'Re FILLETS ARE SO UGLY DUDE... WHAT A MESS... Hahahahahaaaaa. Then I claimed they had OCD and they got mad.
And one dude, Mark was like my eight year old does better. Good times.
 
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