EXPjawa
Well-Known Member
Title says it all. The reissued Black Brant III, Mean Machine, the Alpha VI have now all moved from their "Coming Soon" page to "What's New", and are shown as in-stock.
I did that with my last-generation Mean Machine. I replaced the disconnect coupler with a balsa nose block. Rear on an 18" chute, the front on a streamer seems to work the best for matching descent rates.
pretty much what i was thinking, seems like a much gentler way to bring back over 6 feet of thin-walled rocket
Had to look to see what an Alpha VI was... Going to have to get a couple of those! The old red Alpha III was the first rocket I ever built and the first I ever flew, though they were two different Alpha IIIs!
That was always a fun one and, man, does it go on a C6!
Hmm...C6-5 or C6-7 for this one? I’ve never braved more than a B in one of these. Alpha III are one tough bird and can easily handle fast streamer recovery.
My package of these 3 arrived today from AC Hobbies. Outer cardboard shipping box was crushed on one corner, but luckily all body tubes in the kits inside were fine, lots of airbags in there helped protect everything.
Am I the only one that doesn't actually remember what the first rocket I ever built was? I feel like it might have been an Alpha, but I know I didn't have one in my fleet later on, so if I built it then I don't know where it went. Maybe it was built at camp, or maybe lost in the trees somewhere?Had to look to see what an Alpha VI was... Going to have to get a couple of those! The old red Alpha III was the first rocket I ever built and the first I ever flew, though they were two different Alpha IIIs!
Am I the only one that doesn't actually remember what the first rocket I ever built was? I feel like it might have been an Alpha, but I know I didn't have one in my fleet later on, so if I built it then I don't know where it went. Maybe it was built at camp, or maybe lost in the trees somewhere?
I have much clearer recollections of the models I built afterwards.
You probably painted it with Aerogloss dope then...
I was going to build the α VI stock, but decided to add an ejection baffle and a Kevlar cord, then used the included shock cord at the end of that, which looked to be adequately long by itself anyway, seems like Estes has been trending to including sufficiently long shock cords these days, if I am not imagining things.
The cone and fin can are really shiny, like those little rocket ornaments Estes makes. And the body tube has a nice sheen to it also, really hard to see those reflective highlights in any of the photographs on a computer screen, so I won't bother including another picture here, get one and see it for yourself! The sticker sheet includes two 60th annivesary logos, but the face card placement leaves room on the back side for a second one that would fall under the launch lug line where it might get rod rash, so I might just put the 60th sticker on one side. The assembly of this Alpha VI kit, how you capture the plastic fin can between the engine mount tube and the body tube, kind of reminds me of the Centuri Screaming Eagle kit assembly sequence.
This is my first Alpha kit. My first rocket was the Centuri Viking I got at a Cub Scout Day camp. First kit I "bought" later from one of those sales clubs advertised in the Boy's Life Magazine, by selling greeting cards to neighbors, and mostly to my mom, so I could earn a prize, the Centuri Big Shot launch set with the Screaming Eagle and Excalibur kits and a launch pad that attached to a lantern battery. Very similar to the current Estes Tandem-X launch set with the Crossfire ISX and Amazon kits, which I bought for my son a few years ago when he was a Cub Scout.
Issue Jan 1977 with the Big Grizzly on the cover was my first issue: https://boyslife.org/wayback/
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BigShot color picture from the 1980 Centuri Catalog
https://www.ninfinger.org/rockets/nostalgia/80cen006.html
So are you building yours or keeping it as a collectible?Enjoy the Alpha 6, but carefully. It's limited release for the 60th anniversary and once it's gone, it's gone.
Everyone at NARAM 60 got one in their bags
So are you building yours or keeping it as a collectible?
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