Upgrading a rocket

Hi all,

Is it possible to upgrade a rocket after you've built it? I have a rocket with a 76mm motor mount that I've just been flying on 54mm K's this whole time. Now I'm ready to step up to L's and (eventually) M's for this rocket, but I'm afraid I didn't really build it strong enough.
So the question: would it be acceptable to strip all the paint and primer off the rocket to add another layer of fiberglass on the tubes, and tip to tip glass on the fins?

Thanks!

You can certainly take all those steps, but you're not going to be able to make it 100% as strong as you would have if you had NOT painted first. Any leftover primer (esp. if it has bonded to/soaked into the BT material) is going to reduce the epoxy's ability to soak into the tube. This means your epoxy can only achieve a mechanical bond with the primer, which doesn't adhere as strongly as epoxy-only would.

That said, your rocket will still be plenty strong... you should be able to fly it on the bigger motors without a hitch. If it ever lawn-darts, you'll probably find out where that poor bonding occurred.

If you do it, just be sure to remove as much of the primer/paint as you can.

Good luck!

Thanks Charlie!

With that in mind...that would probably be alot of work huh? I might just build another stronger rocket instead...never hurts to have another one in stock!

Heck yeah! One for low & slow, one to "Go High! Go Fast!"

yeah, that's the problem though, I was very excited for this one, on an 6000ns M it could get close to 16,000 feet at mach 1.67. I'm too original to just build a clone of a rocket I've already got....oh well, time to start designing my next stratch build!