What did you do rocket wise today?

All this talk of Night Launch has me raring to go..hopefully something good to please my egg sucking Grammy who taught me.

So I cut some strips from the bottom of my 5m 5630 LED strip..12 of them ...to be soldered tomorrow.

Got some more krylon white primer from wallyworld today..so wet sanded the soon to be Mega Der Purple Max nosecone and hit it with another coat. Started wet sanding the body..but stopped at the fin can ..the fin leading edges are not quite right..so wanted to look closer tomorrow by the light of day. I did see some nice purple plum krylon paint when shopping today..so will propably go with that after a couple coats of the finish primer.

Also my hpr / Coker style bulkhead and centering ring with hardware make any additional nose weight unneeded for stability...but now up over 1000g .

Kenny

KenRico said:

All this talk of Night Launch has me raring to go..hopefully something good to please my egg sucking Grammy who taught me.

So I cut some strips from the bottom of my 5m 5630 LED strip..12 of them ...to be soldered tomorrow.

Got some more krylon white primer from wallyworld today..so wet sanded the soon to be Mega Der Purple Max nosecone and hit it with another coat. Started wet sanding the body..but stopped at the fin can ..the fin leading edges are not quite right..so wanted to look closer tomorrow by the light of day. I did see some nice purple plum krylon paint when shopping today..so will propably go with that after a couple coats of the finish primer.

Also my hpr / Coker style bulkhead and centering ring with hardware make any additional nose weight unneeded for stability...but now up over 1000g .

Kenny

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....my purple plum Krylon sprayed glops and spits and drips and only worked one time. The nozzle clogged so bad I threw the rest of an expensive can of paint in the trash. You have to spend even more for Dupli-Color, Testors, or Tamiya(or whatever the Japanese hobby brand is) paints for a good purple. I don't know why that is, maybe the expense of quality components needed for a good purple pigment. That does not include WallyWorld Fast Food Low Quality Paints.

Wayco said:

Rebuilt the N/C lights in Warp Core Breach. The 600 L.E.D. strip lights were overwhelming the Diab-glo L.E.D's, so I added another Wolfstar product to kick it up a notch. Not sure how much current everything is drawing so I put two 9v batteries in parallel in the coupler. This rocket has gained a pound since I made it two years ago. The J520 will only take it to 2500 ft. now. Plenty high enough for a night launch.
Bring your sun glasses for Octoberfest, might even be able to see it from the strip in L.V.

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Have you considered running the NightBow off of a 12 volt lipo for extra brightness? I seem to remember that Don stated that it could be run at this voltage (although it runs at a higher temp.)

terryg said:

Have you considered running the NightBow off of a 12 volt lipo for extra brightness? I seem to remember that Don stated that it could be run at this voltage (although it runs at a higher temp.)

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He cautioned me not to exceed 12 vdc, and 3c lipo's fully charged are 12.1. Have you tried this? Have you seen a Nightbow running on 9v? It hurts your eyes!

KenRico said:

All this talk of Night Launch has me raring to go..hopefully something good to please my egg sucking Grammy who taught me.

So I cut some strips from the bottom of my 5m 5630 LED strip..12 of them ...to be soldered tomorrow.

Kenny

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Did you cut them at the solder joints? I tried soldering to the bare pads, but couldn't get the solder to stick. Every 21" there is a solder joint in the strip.

I cut where they show the little scizzors ..about every 3 inches . Will take a pic when home.

Haven't tried yet to solder yet ..have 5m of RGB 5050 as a backup, so not overly concerned .

Kenny

I managed to stuff almost all of my rocketry gear inside my new rocketry workbench and now have two usable workbenches!

In the process of clearing off my original workbench, I found a few small things (F/G kits and other useful items) I'd been looking for.

This getting organized thing is really working out.

Got another Fin on my 29mm Minimum Diameter Crossfire 29X, started building my Estes V2 and finished making Centering Rings for the MMT of another Scratch Build.

Did a bunch of repairs/upgrades to my Partizon to get it ready to fly at Moffet this weekend:
-new Titebond II fillets to reinforce fins
-reinforced trifold shock cord mount
-swapped the 24" stock chute with a 30" madcow chute. While it will descend much slower, it's landing on concrete so the lower impact velocity will help. Also, it'll be flying low impulse F23FJs and F27Rs, so it won't go more than 600-700 feet, so it also won't drift far.

Continued to work on two rockets. One is a clustered with air start low power scratch build. The other is a DS Jr two stage.

Put final layer of fillets on second stage of Critical Mass. Need to work on the booster now. There may be some prep work cause I used plenty of yellow glue for the centering rings and the tube shrank a bit.

While dry fitting stuff for the V2, I decided these little Details on the Tail Cone would look better if I opened them up.

My progress with my two stage F rocket as of today.

Airfoiled some fins. And got a package! Motors, my first at rms, retainers, and a ripstop nylon chute...yeah! Moving up to mid power.

KenRico said:

I cut where they show the little scizzors ..about every 3 inches . Will take a pic when home.

Haven't tried yet to solder yet ..have 5m of RGB 5050 as a backup, so not overly concerned .

Kenny

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Soldered a couple of extensions..seemed to be sticking so went ahead and joined a set of 4 tight.

Kenny

I finally got around to updating my ENG file for wRASP.

TopRamen said:

While dry fitting stuff for the V2, I decided these little Details on the Tail Cone would look better if I opened them up.

View attachment 184585

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Good idea. I think I'll do the same with mine. My V2 kit is open and the next in line after I finish the Critical Mass.

KenRico said:

Soldered a couple of extensions..seemed to be sticking so went ahead and joined a set of 4 tight.

Kenny

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Looks good Kenny, those things are BRIGHT!

I started the Mongoose 75 build yesterday, look for a build thread later today. Also replaced the tubular nylon shock cord in Warp Core Breach with 1/4" kevlar. Now everything fits without compressing it with the N/C.

morlock said:

Good idea. I think I'll do the same with mine. My V2 kit is open and the next in line after I finish the Critical Mass.

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Thanks.
I started them with a tiny Drill Bit, then used my Hobby Knife to gently carve them to shape.
The whole time I was afraid I was going to screw them up or slip and slice myself instead.
They'll help keep the Motor Compartment cool.:wink:

I ran a build session for my entire pack last night.
(25 thing-a-ma-jigs showed up in the mail yesterday afternoon. :headbang: Talk about cutting it close. Totally my fault. Not Jim's)

Things were kind of hectic. I didn't get to spend as much time going over rocketry basics and showing building techniques and tricks as I would have liked since it was a large group, but I think worked out O.K. No one finished their rockets in the hour we had, but the plan if for the kids (and their parents) to finish them up at home, or at next week's pack meeting. (Where we will also be decorating them.)

I wish I had thought to take some pictures of the group working (mostly) diligently. Tigers through Webelos II (and parents) with experienced builders and first timers all working together and helping each other out. It was pretty cool to see. I spent most of my time answering questions, demonstrating steps that people didn't understand, and wielding "The Sword of Exact-Zero"

We only had one mishap which necessitated me turning one of the extra kits into a bag of spare parts. (It was one of my own kids, of course. )

Finally got the Paint on my Martel. I rigged up a large Tomato Cage to use as a Paint thingy. This worked great.
The Color is Krylon Italian Olive.



The Rail Guides are not attached, I just set them on there for the Pic'. I have all the Vinyl I'll need, and will start on that tomorrow.



Kinda' going for this look:

I finished up my daughter's Starlight- Queeze Bee, which is not exactly in it's stock configuration

Got the rail button and vent holes drilled on the WM Sport, Painted a coat of blue on my Mini Fat Boy, and started to look into what I want to get my Level 1 on... There are way to many options! :confused2:

TopRamen said:

Finally got the Paint on my Martel. I rigged up a large Tomato Cage to use as a Paint thingy. This worked great.
The Color is Krylon Italian Olive.

View attachment 184685

The Rail Guides are not attached, I just set them on there for the Pic'. I have all the Vinyl I'll need, and will start on that tomorrow.

View attachment 184690

Kinda' going for this look:

View attachment 184688

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Nice!

Put the first coat of primer on my L1 build (4" Batray). Ugh... I have a lot of filling, sanding, priming ahead of me.

Ordered a TLP FLAIL kit from www.erockets.biz.

I highly recommend doing business with Randy, who offers first class customer service.

CzTeacherMan said:

Put the first coat of primer on my L1 build (4" Batray). Ugh... I have a lot of filling, sanding, priming ahead of me.

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that is why I bought a detail sander, those fins are huge.
Rex

Rex R said:

that is why I bought a detail sander, those fins are huge.
Rex

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Sweet! An excuse to get a new tool!

Finished the "Cosmetic Retro/Repair Fitting" of my TAN-SAM.

Watched a bunch of my Rockets fight it out for the Title of "My Favorite Rocket At The Moment".