Keira's Dr. Zooch Rockets Gumball Lofting Vehicle!

Hello every body on the rockit page,
my daddy is OL' JR, my name is keira. I am 6 years old. (Daddy starts typing to save time Keira dictates what she wants to say).

I am building the GbLV rocket. The GbLV is the Gumball Lofting Vehicle from Dr. Zooch Rockets. I like this rocket because it has a mini-capsule from a gumball machine for a nosecone. It is very cute! I am gonna launch a gummy bear and Mr. Penny in the capsule. The bottom half of the rocket is a BT-60 tube, and the top half is a BT-55 tube. It has four fins. The nosecone has its own parachute for the capsule, and the rocket body has a streamer. It uses A, B, or C motors. I would choose C motors for my rocket. The C motor makes the rocket go the highest (about 511 feet). The least it will go is 88 feet on an A motor. On a B motor, it will go 237 feet.

You are supposed to catch a bug to fly in the capsule, but I don't like bugs. So I'll fly a gummy bear.

There is a lot of parts. I thought it would be complicated, but Daddy said it would be easy to build.

The first thing we did was cut a slit in the tube for the motor hook. Daddy let me use the hobby knife. Daddy showed me how to measure things too. Daddy helped me cut out the strip of paper to strengthen the tube, and I glued it on. (Reinforcement band under the motor hook).

Then we put the motor hook on and taped it down with electrical tape. We put on a ring with a slot in it for the motor hook on the back of the tube. Then we put on the biggest tube in the kit (BT-60). We glued the ring on white glue.

Then we put another ring in the front of the big tube, and glued it in place. Then we put a little ring on top of it and glued it to the big ring.

Then I sanded the end of my tube so the ring would slide inside...


And then we put another little ring 1 1/4 inches in front of the other little ring and glued it in place. Then we put on the shock cord and glued it on. Then we put the last tube (BT-55) in the kit over the two rings and glued it on.

I'll chat more later! Bye bye...
Keira Roberts c:

THE best "build" thread yet! :clap::wave:

Launch the orange or the yellow gummies. They're the yukky ones. Eat the red ones.

And just for you folks who remember Woodstock:

"DON'T EAT THE BROWN GUMMY BEARS!"

Keira...you are doing a great job!!!! keep us posted on how your build goes!!

Hi! I am back!

Daddy helped me cut the paper transition. I cut the flat ends, and Daddy cut the curved parts.

He told me I'd learn to cut the curved parts soon. He showed me where to put the glue on, and I put the white glue on.

Then I put it together. Then we clamped it together with a hemostat to let the glue dry.


We skipped ahead in the instructions to let the glue dry on everything. Next I put the parachute together. Daddy showed me how to put the sticky dots on and I put them all on.


More later!
KNR/ OL JR

I'm back...
I finished putting on the sticky dots on the parachute...:handshake:

Then I cut the holes for the lines in the center of each sticky dot.


We cut the string-- one piece several inches long for the capsule leader, and the rest into three equal pieces for the parachute lines. I cut the thread while Daddy showed me how to make the string into three equal length pieces. Daddy showed me how to tie the knots-- he did the first one but I did the rest.

We tied the leader string to the parachute lines and then put the little hook (snap swivel) on.

We put the capsule together. The clear top part snaps on the green bottom part. We put a penny inside like the instructions said. The penny acts as weight to help make the rocket stable, and come down better under the parachute. Daddy drilled a hole in the top of the capsule for the screw eye. Daddy started it in the hole, but I screwed it in all the way. Then we clipped the snap swivel on. It was already attached to the parachute.

We cut the fin pattern out, I traced it on the balsa wood, and Daddy helped me cut out fins. Then Daddy stacked sanded them. We cut printer paper to glue on the fins. I coated the fins with a thin layer of white glue, and Daddy put the fins on the paper and folded it over. Then I worked out the bubbles with a Sharpie marker. After they dried, I trimmed the fins with the scissors, and Daddy finished trimmed them with the hobby knife, and then we sanded the edges. Daddy showed me how to sand fins.

Rocket say bye-bye for a little while!
KNR/ OL JR

Here I am once again! :grin:

Time to talk about fins... You can attach them to the sides of the tube or through the wall of the tube to make the rocket stronger, because it may land hard with the streamer. We cut out the paper pattern from the wrap sheet, Keira traced the fins onto the wood paying attention to the grain direction, and then Daddy cut out some of the fins and Keira cut out the rest. Then we glued printer paper on them. We trimmed and sanded the edges when dry. Then we painted the fins. I decided I wanted yellow fins. We clipped the fins to a coat hangar with clothespins and spray painted them yellow. Daddy showed me how to use spray paint.

We cut the fin locator wrap out of the wrap sheet, and wrapped it around the tube and taped it together, and marked the rocket tube where the fins go. Then Keira used the angle to put the fin lines on the tube. Daddy lined the fins up along the fin lines and carefully traced around them, then cut out the slots in the tube for the fins to mount through the tube.

Then we put the rocket on the paint stick and took it outside and painted the rocket. We used flat white paint. Daddy showed me how to paint and I painted the rocket some.


While the paint dried, we cut the launch lug ends at an angle to make it look nicer. When the paint dried, we brought the rocket in, and slid the paper transition down the tube and glued it on with white glue. Then we glued on the fins using double-glue joints.

When they were dry, I filleted the fins with yellow wood glue.

Daddy cut out the 'ejection cone' that goes in the end of the rocket. It's sort of a funnel that lets the parachute slide past the ring the capsule sits on. I glued it together and clamped it with a hemostat while Daddy sanded the ring so the capsule fit smoothly in it. Then we glued the funnel into the ring and let it dry. We filleted it with white glue, and the next day, Daddy sanded it down smooth and glued it in the top of the rocket so the parachute and streamer can come out.

Bye for now... I'm tired...
KNR/ OL' JR

Awesome, thread!

I got to see this rocket fly under development when Wes brought it out to an MDRA launch. What a cool little kit. I know the good Dr. will love the great job you're doing.

Hi! I am back once again! :wink:

Now I'm gonna tell you more about my rocket. We left off putting the glue fillets on. I spread them smoothly with my finger.

Next I folded the streamer in half to find the center, and Daddy helped tie the Nomex shock cord in a knot around the streamer. Then I put a drop of CA glue to hold the knot together forever.

This rocket uses both a parachute and a streamer. Because of that, we have to pack it in a special way. The first thing you do is put in two pieces of wadding. I pushed them down with an old chopstick.

Next we accordion folded the streamer.

Once it's accordion folded, we put the streamer in the tube on top of the wadding.

More to come!
KNR/OL JR

Cont'd...

Next we put in another piece of wadding. This keeps the kevlar shock cord and streamer from tangling with the parachute.

Then we put a penny in the capsule for ballast. We used clay because CA glue didn't work-- don't trust it!

I snap the capsule together.

Gather and fold the parachute.


More coming!
KNR/OL JR

Continued...

Next we put the parachute in the rocket.

Then we put the shroud lines in on top-- don't wind them around the parachute like normal. Just roll them up and put them on top of the parachute. Stuff the leader line from the parachute shroud lines in on top as well. Then put the gumball capsule on top of the rocket.

Now the rocket is finished!!

After gymnastics this evening Daddy and I took some pictures of the finished rocket. I was hot today!!!

Here's another picture of the rocket.


Later! :roll:

KNR/OL JR

Cont'd...

Here's the bottom of the rocket...

And here's the top!

There are too many wildfires right now, but I really want to fly my rocket. I hope it will rain soon!

THANK YOU DR. ZOOCH FOR THIS ROCKET! I HAD SO MUCH FUN BUILDING IT!

It's a neat kit... you would love it if you had it!

See you at the flight!
Later!
KNR/OL JR

Fun!

FUN!

If rocketry ain't fun, yer' doin' it wrong.

Keira- You are doin' it RIGHT!!!

Hope Gummynaut has a good flight:wave::wave::wave:

(I put a lot of wave in there because my little girl likes "the silly faces wave."

Great build!!! We need to see more builds like this one. Seeing kids participate in our hobby is much more gratifying than the usual gang of old men who post here.

I can't wait til my grand daughter is ready for her first build.

Good job Keira!!!!!!:clap:

Nice build Keira!

Greg

Keira...you did an awesome job!! what a great build thread too!! I can't wait to see not only your rocket fly...but what your payload will be! let us know!!

Dr.Zooch said:

Fun!

FUN!

If rocketry ain't fun, yer' doin' it wrong.

Keira- You are doin' it RIGHT!!!

Hope Gummynaut has a good flight:wave::wave::wave:

(I put a lot of wave in there because my little girl likes "the silly faces wave."

Click to expand...

What a wonderful attitude.

I think that it this type of attitude, well expressed here but also present in some many other vendors as well, that has kept me interested in rocketry despite my numerous blunders and ill advised schemes.

Thanks, Doc, for the reminder of what its all about.

Thanks too to Keira for showing me that, if I try hard enough, I can make a fun, good looking project as well.

Great job Kiera on a fine looking rocket.

I can't wait to hear how it flies.

Hi Kiera,
Thanks for posting your build thread.
I showed it to my 12 year old daughter, Madison.
You might have inspired her to build one!

Good work!
I'm looking forward to the flight and payload results.

THANK YOU! I love every body who sent me a nice messeg! I WANT TO THANK YOU!:blush:

KNR

Dear Keira,
I am very glad that you are enjoying making your Gumball Lofting Vehicle! I'm sure your father is very proud of your interest in rockets. I thought you might like to know that not only can you fly a gummy bear in the capsule at the top, but my daughter told me about some toys called "Squinkies" that are just the right size for the gumball capsule. I bought an Incredible Hulk Squinky to be my GLV astronaut. He's a little green man, going to Mars.....you can find more Squinkies as https://shop.squinkies.com/
Have a great launch.....

Well, Keira flew her Gumball Lofting Vehicle last month at the Old Rocketeers launch here at Needville. It flew beautifully on a C6-5. I didn't get around to posting the pics of it, though. Unfortunately, she was rather excited when we stopped by my folks after the launch and let her capsule fall out of the truck... the dog had chewed it to smithereens by the time we got home, realized it was gone, and went back to look for it. SO, out came the quarters and after a trip to a couple gumball machines, we had a few new capsules ready for modification-- adding a bit of clay and a penny to them in the bottom to move the CG a bit forward and give them a little more weight during recovery to help chute deployment and bring them down a bit faster... We also got some "king size" gumball capsules for an experiment... I cut a small chute out of scrap material and attached shrouds and a leader to it, reused the salvaged screw eye from the first capsule, and she was back in business...

Here's the first launch... Keira hooks up the GbLV on the pad...

Gives her countdown and LIFTOFF! (burst mode shots follow) It was a little breezy so it weathercocked a bit...

More to come! OL JR

Here's a few more shots from the inaugural flight of the GbLV...

Continuing to ascend (continuation of the burst mode liftoff shots)...

The booster comes down under streamer into some short clover...

Keira retrieves her capsule which came down under chute a bit further away...

Happy girl with her booster and capsule, complete with "gummy-naut" that she consumed later... I think she came down with something because she wants to fly rockets more and more now...

Later! OL JR

Keira....GREAT JOB!! I hope you had fun flying your rocket!!....did you put anything in the payload compartment?

Great work Keira! :w:

My twin nieces Andrea and Rosemary are 6 as well. They came out last October to help us launch rockets and had a lot of fun counting down and pushing the launch button (they got real good at that real fast).

They know how to check if the continuity light is on and to call "heads up" when they are ready to launch. They even know the rockets will usually drift down into the wind on their parachutes.

I just gave their big brother Jack (13) a rocket kit for his birthday so they may have a rocket-building festival up there.

:y::y:

Last weekend, we conducted the first joint launch between the Alamo Rocketeers from San Antonio and the Old Rocketeers from Houston at our farm at Shiner, Texas, about halfway between Houston and San Antonio. It was a fun launch! Keira launched her GbLV twice more, once with the "regular" size small capsule like the one the kit comes with, one with the "Orion" big gumball capsule that we got from the machine (more on that in a little bit...) The first flight was "stock" with a replacement small capsule we got from a gumball machine and with as small parachute I made about the size of a coffee can bottom from spare material... the only thing I could salvage from her first capsule after the dog got it was the screw eye...

Keira shows off her new capsule after prepping her GbLV...

Puts it on the pad and hooks it up...

And takes over at the launch panel...

Gives her countdown...

And, LIFTOFF!!

More coming! OL JR

NJRick said:

Keira....GREAT JOB!! I hope you had fun flying your rocket!!....did you put anything in the payload compartment?

Click to expand...

It's me Jeff... Keira's hit the sack... field trip tomorrow!!! :horse:

She flew a gummy bear on the inaugural flight... and promptly ate him about ten minutes after he landed... LOL

I'll try to get her on here tomorrow to read yall's comments and offer her thoughts on everything...

Later! OL JR

Here's the liftoff burst of her GbLV launch...


Winds were NEARLY perfect... 0-3 mph generally out of the east...
More coming! OL JR

Keira gets some help from her cousin Jeremy in recovering her GbLV... he went after the booster while she retrieved the capsule... It was a BEAUTIFUL day, best flying weather I've seen in a couple years-- a tad warm in the 80's but little/no wind... and the bluebonnets and other wildflowers are in full bloom on the Shiner place...

She shows off her first "manned" flight, with the lil toy kid that came in the gumball capsule out of the gumball machine...

And gives herself a "rocket hug" for a job well done... LOL

More coming! OL JR