Estes Mega Der Red Max

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rocketron1948

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Just picked up an Estes Pro Series II Mega Der Red Max for Father's Day. There are some features I lke about the kit and others that I question. The fins are thick three ply constructio similar to the Estes Mega Mosquito kit. Included are six sheets of hardwood that have to be joined together to make six pieces that the fins are cut out of. The total thickness after the fins are assembled is about 3/8" They are very heavy and draggy. The center peice for the fins is about 1/4" has thru the wall fin attachments with hollowed out sections in the middle I think if they just made the fins out of solid 1/4" hardwood it would have reduced the cost of the kit and made it much lighter. The kit has a total weight of about 31 oz. It is very similar in size and design to the old North Coast Big Brute kit which had a total weight of about 24 oz. and had plywood fins. Other than that it is a nice kit. It has very large waterslide decals which will be a challenge to apply. I am not a big fan of peel and stick decals but they may have been a better choice on this kit for ease of application. Lastly Estes indicates on the packaging a maximum altitude of 500 ft. Even with the draggy fins Rocksim indicates an altitude of well in excess of 1,000 ft. with a G80-7 engine. Any opinions?

Rocketron
 
I haven't built one, yet. It certainly sounds like the fins could have been made like you say. I guess Estes
wants you to build into the Fun. (not on the fins, geez)
Be nice if you post up plenty of photos.

JP
 
I have one and have been flying it the last two summers. On a G80 skid it gets right around the 500' Mark on a 5 second delay. Nice flying rocket.

Dennis


Sent from my iPad using Rocketry Forum
 
We fly them a LOT at MDRA. One guy has about six of them, I have only two. We are big fans of the kit and we are pretty opinionated about it, so get ready :)

There is nothing about this rocket that is about high performance. This is a low-and-slow, draggy rocket that looks cool. The fins are *supposed* to be squared off, thick, and draggy. It's supposed to look like a late-war product of desperately agricultural german engineering.

But it flies great. We've sent stock-built MDRMs up on H410 Vmax motors and they don't even blink. On a good smoky or sparky motor they are awesome. CTI white thunder is good as well. We have guys putting bigger motor mounts in it and trying all sorts of crazy things. No matter what you do it goes up straight and true and you get to watch the while flight because it doesn't go too high.

Trust me on this one. A Max with skinny fins looks silly and doesn't make for a more interesting launch. Build it up, put a cool paint job on it, get some graphics from Mark at stickershock, and then see if you can find it's limits. We haven't found them yet.




Sent from my iPhone using Rocketry Forum
 
Totally agree with Bill's post above. The MDRM is a great performer, I am putting the finishing touches on a 38mm powered version, we've been pushing the Max, other than one or two mishaps that I've seen (delays drilled wrong, or humidity making the NC stick and coming in Ballistic) these things, built right, are tanks!
For my current one, I used 1/4" centering rings, going to foam the nose cone and insert an av-bay for an RRC2+ to fire a cable cutter. Early predictions are around 1700ft on an H125 Classic. Then I am eyeing up that New CTI I55 Mellow with the 7 second burn, have to wait and run a sim on it though.
 
Last edited:
rocketron1948 said:
Just picked up an Estes Pro Series II Mega Der Red Max for Father's Day. There are some features I lke about the kit and others that I question. The fins are thick three ply constructio similar to the Estes Mega Mosquito kit. Included are six sheets of hardwood that have to be joined together to make six pieces that the fins are cut out of. The total thickness after the fins are assembled is about 3/8" They are very heavy and draggy. The center peice for the fins is about 1/4" has thru the wall fin attachments with hollowed out sections in the middle I think if they just made the fins out of solid 1/4" hardwood it would have reduced the cost of the kit and made it much lighter. The kit has a total weight of about 31 oz. It is very similar in size and design to the old North Coast Big Brute kit which had a total weight of about 24 oz. and had plywood fins. Other than that it is a nice kit. It has very large waterslide decals which will be a challenge to apply. I am not a big fan of peel and stick decals but they may have been a better choice on this kit for ease of application. Lastly Estes indicates on the packaging a maximum altitude of 500 ft. Even with the draggy fins Rocksim indicates an altitude of well in excess of 1,000 ft. with a G80-7 engine. Any opinions?

Rocketron
Click to expand...

I picked up one of these not long ago and noticed the same things about the fins. Can't say I've ever seen something like it before but from what I gather it's good to go, although a few extra steps in the build.
 
rocketron1948 said:
I think if they just made the fins out of solid 1/4" hardwood it would have reduced the cost of the kit and made it much lighter. The kit has a total weight of about 31 oz. It is very similar in size and design to the old North Coast Big Brute kit which had a total weight of about 24 oz. and had plywood fins.
Click to expand...

The Max has larger fins than the Brute, I believe. I can confirm that the solid plywood 6mm fins on my Mega Der Drei Max are about 40% heavier than the fins on my Mega Der Dead Max which are reinforced stock versions. G-Dog on the forum has about six of these things and his fins are totally stock and about half the weight of those on the Mega Der Dead max.

They were trying to make the fins thick and square without adding too much weight.
 
wfcook said:
The Max has larger fins than the Brute, I believe. I can confirm that the solid plywood 6mm fins on my Mega Der Drei Max are about 40% heavier than the fins on my Mega Der Dead Max which are reinforced stock versions. G-Dog on the forum has about six of these things and his fins are totally stock and about half the weight of those on the Mega Der Dead max.

They were trying to make the fins thick and square without adding too much weight.
Click to expand...

I'll have to weigh my new one once its done, I put 1/4" baltic birch fins on the 38mm version. my stock (sort of) 29mm one has epoxy clay fillets which I wont use again, and comes in right at 48oz with chute and 20ft of tubular nylon, and quick links.
 
Bills Canted 3 motor max is sick!
Here's another drag race from last winter on all skidmarks:

IMG_3009.JPG
 
dgreger said:
...these things, built right, are tanks!
Click to expand...
They sure are. I've flown my stock-built MDRM on an H265R, and I200W, great flights! The *only* thing I changed was a long kevlar shock cord.
 

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