New scratch build, Hanna & Nicole

qquake2k · Jul 11, 2012

Two of the girls at work have asked me when I was going to name rockets after them. Meet Hanna and Nicole. It's a simple design, BT-60, elliptical fins and nose cone, zipperless, 24mm motor mount, and about 30" long. Hanna will be black and white, and Nicole will be pink and white. The colors match their personalities. LOL

View attachment Hanna_Nicole_elliptical_long.ork

qquake2k · Jul 11, 2012

The fins are 1/8" birch plywood. I pinned them with 3/16" dowels, and cut them with the bandsaw. I match sanded them with the stationary sander.

qquake2k · Jul 11, 2012

The body tubes are Estes BT-60, which I cut to length with the bandsaw. I flooded the cut ends with thin CA so I could sand them smooth. I cut the centering rings out of light ply with hole saws as usual, and trimmed them to final size with the wood lathe and Dremel. The small discs will be the half moon baffles. I epoxied the forward rings to the motor tubes.

qquake2k · Jul 11, 2012

I ordered Estes couplers, but they're only 1-1/2" long and way too short. I had one Surefire coupler from Hobbylinc, but it's only 2" long. I need longer couplers for the zipperless baffle, so I ordered some 4" long ones from BMS. I drilled the baffle plates with a 3/16" drill bit, and plugged the pilot holes.

qquake2k · Jul 11, 2012

I cut the half moon baffles, and drilled the 5/32" holes in the baffle plates for the small eyebolts. I epoxied the half moons in the motor tubes, coating the backs with epoxy to protect them from the heat of the ejection charges.

qquake2k · Jul 11, 2012

I ordered pink and black 24" nylon parachutes, but they may be too big. I might need to go with 18". Motor blocks were epoxied into the motor tubes, the motor hooks were installed, and the eyebolt nuts coated with epoxy.

qquake2k · Jul 11, 2012

I cut the fin slots with an X-Acto knife. I had to sand a corner off each fin to allow clearance for the epoxy fillets on the aft centering rings. The fins were epoxied on with my homemade fin alignment guide as usual.

qquake2k · Jul 11, 2012

I used Titebond molding glue for the fin fillets, and attached the 3/16" launch lugs with epoxy. I think the rockets are gonna look cute!

Tomoseph · Jul 11, 2012

qquake2k said:
I used Titebond molding glue for the fin fillets, and attached the 3/16" launch lugs with epoxy. I think the rockets are gonna look cute!

Wow nice looking rockets so far, could you post a launch vid sometime?

qquake2k · Jul 11, 2012

Tomoseph said:
Wow nice looking rockets so far, could you post a launch vid sometime?

Sure, as soon as I launch them. I take vids of almost all of my launches. Since these will fly on D's or E's, I might launch them in the park instead of waiting for the next club launch in October or November.

CarVac · Jul 11, 2012

You can just cut big vent holes in the chutes using a soldering iron if you are concerned about excessively slow descent.

Rex R · Jul 11, 2012

they ought to be photographed with their namesakes

.
rex

qquake2k · Jul 11, 2012

Rex R said:
they ought to be photographed with their namesakes .
rex

Oh, they will be once the rockets are finished.

bill2654 · Jul 11, 2012

In Bikini's!

Wayco · Jul 11, 2012

I can only find one MAJOR flaw in these rockets. There is something wrong with a girly rocket made zipperless......:rofl::wink: Aside from that, great build!

o1d_dude · Jul 11, 2012

Nice looking rockets, Jim.

Ideally, you get both of them to press the button when launch season rolls around. I'm sure Hanna would be up for it as she's attended more launches than the average person. Dunno about Nicole thos as I've never made her acquaintance.

Drag race them perhaps?

qquake2k · Jul 11, 2012

CarVac said:
You can just cut big vent holes in the chutes using a soldering iron if you are concerned about excessively slow descent.

No, I was more concerned about the parachutes' bulk and weight.

qquake2k · Jul 11, 2012

Wayco said:
I can only find one MAJOR flaw in these rockets. There is something wrong with a girly rocket made zipperless......:rofl::wink: Aside from that, great build!

:tongue:

qquake2k · Jul 11, 2012

o1d_dude said:
Nice looking rockets, Jim.

Ideally, you get both of them to press the button when launch season rolls around. I'm sure Hanna would be up for it as she's attended more launches than the average person. Dunno about Nicole thos as I've never made her acquaintance.

Drag race them perhaps?

Yeah, Hanna will be up for it. Nicole, I don't know yet. She has talked about going to a launch, but I can't really see her going, for some reason. Wind and dirt don't seem to be her thing. But she is full of surprises, so who knows? And like I said, we may launch them at the park. They'll go under 300 feet on C11's. I thought about drag racing them, but if both girls are there, they may each want to press the button for their rocket.

qquake2k · Jul 11, 2012

I ordered the decals today. Originally, I was planning on having them write their names with a Sharpie and scanning them. But frankly, their handwriting is kind of boring. So I ordered decals from the scans and decals in Brushscript. I'll decide which look better when I get them. Either way, the decals will be white on the colored upper body tubes.

GuitarRockets · Jul 11, 2012

:clap:

op:

qquake2k · Jul 12, 2012

Got the fins sealed and sanded, and the rockets primered. Looks like I still have some sanding to do.

qquake2k · Jul 12, 2012

I'm pretty happy with how these are turning out. I think they're going to look good with their two-tone paint jobs.

Scotty Dog · Jul 12, 2012

qquake2k said:
I think they're going to look good with their two-tone paint jobs.

Two rockets with two tone paint jobs.
You are a glutting for paint punishment.:bangbang:
They look cool up to this point....

qquake2k · Jul 14, 2012

Scotty Dog said:
Two rockets with two tone paint jobs.
You are a glutting for paint punishment.:bangbang:
They look cool up to this point....

Yeah, I'm a glutton for punishment. I don't think it's going to be too bad, though. I don't need to mask anything on the upper body tubes. I will need to mask the fins, but I'm going to cut along the tape with an X-Acto knife before I pull it off this time. Hopefully that'll keep the paint from peeling.

qquake2k · Jul 14, 2012

I got the 4" long couplers from BMS. They were a little tight, so I sanded them a bit on the lathe. Normally I would flood one end with thin CA, but the bottle of CA I have got thick. Not sure if it thickened in the heat of the garage (although that's never happened before), or if maybe it's actually medium CA with the wrong label on it. Regardless, I was afraid it would be too thick.

I've always wondered if you could use something besides CA for this. I decided to try sanding sealer. I sprayed a couple of coats on it, and sanded and polished it on the lathe once it had dried. Smooth as glass!

qquake2k · Jul 14, 2012

I epoxied the baffle plates into the couplers, and painted one of the body tubes pink. O1d_dude's favorite paint!

qquake2k · Jul 14, 2012

Painted the nose cones gloss white. It didn't dry as quickly as I thought it would. Oops! Also painted the other body tube gloss black.

qquake2k · Jul 14, 2012

And finally painted the lower sections gloss white.

qquake2k · Jul 15, 2012

I made a couple stands for the rockets.

New scratch build, Hanna & Nicole

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