Two New rocket enthusiasts!

It's fun bringing someone new into the hobby! Keep up the Good Work!!! Post Pics!

well the thread title does say new rocket enthusiasts...
Rex

Rex R said:

well the thread title does say new rocket enthusiasts...
Rex

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Good point. :lol:

Zeus-cat said:

This actually is a legitimate rocket video. I had my doubts from someone with 2 posts and not much of an explanation.

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thanks! I'm new, haven't gotten up to speed yet on the forums. glad you like the vid!

bibbster said:

Yeah, I was kinda wondering. Seemed randomly inserted.

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Your never going to find the exciting parts of the internet if you don't just click every random link you see. Gotta live the adventure.

mbecks said:

Your never going to find the exciting parts of the internet if you don't just click every random link you see. Gotta live the adventure.

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It's all fun and games until you get the dreaded blue screen of death. :lol:

Well, we launched a couple rockets Sunday afternoon. We launched the Estes Flying Colors for the first time. The flight was good, but the delay in the ejection seemed kinda long.
[video=youtube;829qPHkO9sc]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=829qPHkO9sc[/video]

The second launch of our Estes Flip Flyer didn't go so great. The first launch was perfect on the first flight motor, however the second launch using a C6-5, well, here is a video. We are not sure what happened so any thoughts are appreciated. The ground was so soft from all of the rain that it prevent any major damage. It nosed into the ground about 4 - 5 inches. The fins are all loose and the engine holder is cracked. We can fix those things easy enough, but I'd really like to know what caused such an erratic flight. There was zero wind, the clay was still in the nose cone tip, and we never added anything to the rocket that wasn't there on the first flight. What we are now calling the FLOP Flyer...
[video=youtube;R5IgsIKWRU8]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R5IgsIKWRU8[/video]

Ok I'll take a shot...

bibbster said:

Well, we launch a couple rockets Sunday afternoon. We launched the Estes Flying Colors for the first time. The flight was good, but the delay in the ejection seemed kinda long.
[video]https://youtu.be/829qPHkO9sc[/video]

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Yep, about 2 seconds too long by my unofficial "one thousand one..." count. What motor was that ?

bibbster said:

The second launch of our Estes Flip Flyer didn't go so great. The first launch was perfect on the first flight motor, however the second launch using a C6-5, well, here is a video. We are not sure what happened so any thoughts are appreciated. The ground was so soft from all of the rain that it prevent any major damage. It nosed into the ground about 4 - 5 inches. The fins are all loose and the engine holder is cracked. We can fix those things easy enough, but I'd really like to know what caused such an erratic flight. There was zero wind, the clay was still in the nose cone tip, and we never added anything to the rocket that wasn't there on the first flight. What we are now calling the FLOP Flyer...
[video]https://youtu.be/R5IgsIKWRU8[/video]

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Yeah, that one sure looked tail-heavy. Seemed like it started tumbling right when the "up" part of the motor burn stopped and the coast phase began. IDK... maybe one or more rotors shook loose ?

To embed the videos in your posting, use the full URLs (with www.youtube.com at the beginning). The forum software cannot recognize the shortened youtu.be urls.

Flight 1: what motor did you use for the Flying Colors? Estes recommends B4-2 for first flight, which would have had a significantly shorter delay than what you had there.

Flight 2: that was some quality skywriting there. It was tearing off sideways from the get-go. Seems like the center of gravity was too far back, but if your clay was still in place then I don't have any guesses why that might have been.

Thanks for the tip on the URL's.

The Flying Colors was in fact a B4-2. We verified it against the package before and after the flight because it seemed to be too long of a delay. I'm wondering if the other 5 have the same delay.

Regarding the Flip Flyer, at this point I guess we'll get it all fixed up and try it again. I'm not sure what would have caused the center of gravity to shift. The only thing that we added was a small amount of cellulose insulation, which is what we used for the first launch. Everything else about the rocket was unchanged from the first flight.

Flip Flier definitely went unstable. When I got mine, I extended the airframe by two inches. Might help.

Bat-mite said:

Flip Flier definitely went unstable. When I got mine, I extended the airframe by two inches. Might help.

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We're gonna need a parts supply! Mwuahahahahahaha!!!

I will note that the flop flyer 1st and 2nd flights were not the same configurations, a C6 motor is 0.2oz. heavier than the B6(although in this case that shouldn't be a problem since Estes design criteria is 1.5 cal stability margin). however weight may be an issue...check your launch lugs for binding/sticky launch rod. the rocket might not have been moving fast enough for the fins to work(looked kind of slow coming off the rod to me). you might also want to check the weight of the rocket cat lists the weight at 3.2oz.
Rex

Rex, thanks for your feedback. I will definitely check the weight and such for comparison as well as the launch lug and rod. I plan to do that this weekend if time allows. I'll report back asap.

Rex, I didn't find any issue with the rocket over the past weekend, so we'll give it another go at some point. Who knows.

In other news, we finished up a couple more rockets over the weekend and launched one as well. Our weekend officially kicked off Friday afternoon with my daughter showing up wearing this shirt:


The first rocket we built that required painting, gluing fins, etc., was an Estes 220 Swift. We changed up the colors a bit though. The winds on the ground were calm, but apparently not so much higher up. The darn little thing was so tiny we lost sight of it. Not only that, it went WAY higher than we expected. Lesson learned: Don't get attached to the rockets you build.

Here is the last time we saw our 220 Swift, and a short vid of it's maiden and final launch.


[video=youtube;czNbTr_VyW0]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=czNbTr_VyW0&feature=youtu.be[/video]

And a pic of our Estes Trajector that as some of you may recall I screwed up the engine block assembly. We obtained replacement parts and I then made a reminder from the originals, which, has a double meaning. :lol: I donned my 'lazy weekend of rocket buiding garb' for this shot.


And the Estes Jetliner we completed. This kit, like many of the others we have purchased recently, were made years ago. The decals in this kit were a little iffy, but we made them work. Just need a light coat of Future on them and they'll be good for flight.

What engine did you use for the Swift? Those very small and light rockets are notorious for disappearing in the sky. Looked nice on the pad though.

But yeah, standard rule is don't launch anything you're not willing to lose. Sad but true.

For what it's worth, you have the pods backwards on the Trajector; the point bits are supposed to point forward. It might actually look better the way you did it, but be forewarned those little guys might be inclined to snap off on landing. In the future, you can always lop them all off, which IMHO would look better still.

The Jetliner looks great. So cool to see your daughter getting into it.

That Trajector is a fun rocket. It can go pretty high on an F motor, so I’d try the E on the first flight.

Sorry about the lost rocket, but that’s part of the hobby — if you can’t take the losses, you should have got a model train! :wink:

neil_w said:

What engine did you use for the Swift? Those very small and light rockets are notorious for disappearing in the sky. Looked nice on the pad though.

But yeah, standard rule is don't launch anything you're not willing to lose. Sad but true.

For what it's worth, you have the pods backwards on the Trajector; the point bits are supposed to point forward. It might actually look better the way you did it, but be forewarned those little guys might be inclined to snap off on landing. In the future, you can always lop them all off, which IMHO would look better still.

The Jetliner looks great. So cool to see your daughter getting into it.

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We didn't have any of the First Flight engine size, 1/4A3-3T, but went with the next one up, 1/2A3-2T. I told my daughter we'd get out a fishing pole and attach the line to the next one. :lol:

Yeah, we glued the pods on backards (I'm a WV native so...) for sure. Character and customization! Yeah, let's go with that.

The little Jetliner turned out well. She did about 85% of the work, including placing the decals. I cut them out, but she handled the rest. She did all the sanding, priming and all but the last coat of paint. After the Trajector engine assembly fiasco I'm surprised that she had me do the one for the Jetliner, but I got this one right the first time.

We're having fun!

ThirstyBarbarian said:

That Trajector is a fun rocket. It can go pretty high on an F motor, so I’d try the E on the first flight.

Sorry about the lost rocket, but that’s part of the hobby — if you can’t take the losses, you should have got a model train! :wink:

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I'm not sure why, and I questioned it, but the package says to use the F motor for first flight. That seemed wrong to me. I even had my daughter look at the package to verify what I thought I saw and she did.

Thanks for the condolences. We'll probably buy another and try again. Maybe we'll put a siren and blinking lights on this one...and that previously mentioned fishing pole/line.

bibbster said:

I'm not sure why, and I questioned it, but the package says to use the F motor for first flight. That seemed wrong to me. I even had my daughter look at the package to verify what I thought I saw and she did.

Thanks for the condolences. We'll probably buy another and try again. Maybe we'll put a siren and blinking lights on this one...and that previously mentioned fishing pole/line.

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If you have plenty of room, the F motor will be fine. The rocket is big enough that it doesn't fly out of sight, but it'll go high enough it can drift a fair distance. Another really fun thing to do with that rocket is to buy the PSII booster and do 2-stage flights. 2 E motors makes a cool 2-stage flight.

ThirstyBarbarian said:

If you have plenty of room, the F motor will be fine. The rocket is big enough that it doesn't fly out of sight, but it'll go high enough it can drift a fair distance. Another really fun thing to do with that rocket is to buy the PSII booster and do 2-stage flights. 2 E motors makes a cool 2-stage flight.

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Funny you mentioned those PSII boosters. We went into our local Hobby Lobby and found one of those along with a couple other boosters on clearance. A whopping $0.30 each. I kid you not! I figured for the price, even if we never use them they were worth picking up.

You had the rocket-losing trifecta on that Swift: small fast rocket plus mottled sky so you can't see the tracking smoke plus watching through a camera. We like videos and photos, but it makes it hard to keep the rocket in sight.

boatgeek said:

You had the rocket-losing trifecta on that Swift: small fast rocket plus mottled sky so you can't see the tracking smoke plus watching through a camera. We like videos and photos, but it makes it hard to keep the rocket in sight.

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Yeah, I looked up and saw the ejection charge pop but by then it was so high there was no way I'd have seen it. It may be time to build a big and slow moving rocket like the Super Big Bertha or Maxi Alpha III that we have. :lol:

Well, looky here! It seems our little Swift was stuck in a cedar tree (about 60' NE from the launch pad) where we couldn't see it, and then after a storm that came through, it wonderfully came down to the ground to be found sticking its nose into the mud about 1/2". It is mostly just dirty, but I've not tried to see if an engine will fit in it or not. We may just clean it up and put it on the shelf considering the first launch experience. :lol:

Welcome (back) to the hobby, sounds like you're having a great time with your daughter.

Thanks, Paul. Yes we are having a great time together. Fun stuff for sure!

We built a few more over the weekend. These are the MPC kits. Fun little kits to put together. We have not launched any of them as the weather was crummy this weekend. Anybody launch these? Any tips/tricks/gotchas?

We also put up a display 'rack' of sorts, which you can see on the wall behind my daughter. We just need to launch more rockets so we'll have more used engines for display mounting.

It's been a bit since I have updated our projects, so here are a couple more we finished up recently.

We took some creative liberties with the Prowler and made one fin and the nose cone the same color found in the decals. The Eggs Caliber is Corvette Torch Red and satin black. Nose cone is painted on the inside as is the silly face decal.

No flights yet as the weather or scheduling hasn't allowed it.

Started a Baby Bertha on Friday night and finished it Sunday...and launched it! BB is painted Tamiya TS-25 Pink and Model Master Panther Pink.

Also papered fins for a CFX-Six Footer from Sunward. This was our first go round with papering fins and we did pretty well. We had one fin that had too much glue apparently. I guess we'll have to cut a new fin. Hopefully Hobby Lobby had balsa in the same thickness.

We launched the Jetliner we built earlier for the first time, which flew terrible with the ejection charge not going off until the rocket was on the ground. We used the first flight engine recommended but it clearly needed more altitude or a shorter delay. Oh well. It wasn't damage and it will fly another day...maybe.

That’s a pretty Baby !