Quest T series?

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JPVegh

JPVegh

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Has anybody heard anything on whether or not not Quest is planning to bring these to market anytime soon?
 
I gots no use for a D8 just like I got no use for an Aero-Tech 24mm D9 reload.

But Quest E and Fs now you have my attention.

What impulse range on the Quest T's?

Andrew
 
accooper said:
I gots no use for a D8 just like I got no use for an Aero-Tech 24mm D9 reload.

But Quest E and Fs now you have my attention.

What impulse range on the Quest T's?

Andrew
Click to expand...

The only NAR certified Quest T series is an A3.

I assume these are made in china by Zhongtian. If so they also make a 1/2A3 and a B2 in 13mm and an A1 in 10.5mm, These could be handy in competition if they could be brought to market in the U.S.
 
accooper said:
I gots no use for a D8 just like I got no use for an Aero-Tech 24mm D9 reload.

But Quest E and Fs now you have my attention.

What impulse range on the Quest T's?

Andrew
Click to expand...

Here are pictures of the Quest E and F motors taken at NARAM-50.

N50-Q12 E12-4 Thunderjet.jpg

N50-Q10 F12-7 Thunderjet.jpg
 
Initiator001 said:
Here are pictures of the Quest E and F motors taken at NARAM-50.
Click to expand...
Both Quest motors have more than 30 grams of propellant and and the F12 would have to have less than 62.5 grams. A full 40 Ns E motor would have 50 grams of BP and a 50 ns 25% F would have have the maximum 62.5 grams of BP. These BP motors are not mailable so how many folks would be willing to pay a $25 hazmat fee every time they order them, especially since AT has equivalent APCP motors that have not more than 30 grams of propellant which can be mailed via USPS without any hazmat fee?

I wonder what the real market is for these motors. Quest is currently having rocket motor made in China? To be economical, I think you would have to order a container load of motors. While there's a sufficient market for A through D BP motors, I'm not sure the market will support the bigger BP motors because of the inherently higher shipping costs. No good business person is going to import a lot of motors that may not sell for a very long time.

Bob
 
I'm more interested in the 13mm B and 10.5mm A that SKY makes. I have to wonder why no one is trying to get these on the U.S. market.
 
bobkrech said:
I wonder what the real market is for these motors. Quest is currently having rocket motor made in China? To be economical, I think you would have to order a container load of motors. While there's a sufficient market for A through D BP motors, I'm not sure the market will support the bigger BP motors because of the inherently higher shipping costs. No good business person is going to import a lot of motors that may not sell for a very long time.
Click to expand...
Bob,

You make some good points.

OTOH, these are BP motors - no one else is offering a BP F motor. Quest would have a market niche all to itself (for a while). And, IIRC, the Quest E motor is higher impulse than the Estes E. So they should enjoy some decent margin on these uncommon motors.

As for the hazmat, I agree, but that only applies to mail order. If they were sold thru brick-and-mortar shops, the hazmat would be amortized over many motors and present only a small adder per motor. In some cases, such as at Hobby Lobby for example, they ship from their own warehouses which should further reduce the per-motor hazmat fees.

My take is that the problem is likely more of an import regulatory headache than a profitability issue.

If the gov't (ATF or whoever) allows the D5's and D8's to be imported, the larger motors should get the same treatment, but they could indeed be looking at the amount of BP in the E's and F's and judging them to be somehow more of a threat.

I know it's illogical, but we're talking about the federal gov't, and they're not always so logical ;)

Doug

.
 
JPVegh said:
I'm more interested in the 13mm B and 10.5mm A that SKY makes. I have to wonder why no one is trying to get these on the U.S. market.
Click to expand...
SKY(TM) is a trademark of Shaanxi Zhongtian Rocket Technology Co., Ltd. https://www.made-in-china.com/showroom/skymodel

They make motors for Quest and kits for Apogee.

I think if either Quest or Apogee thought there was a profitable market for the Sky(TM) 13 mm 1/2A3-2; A3-2,-4; B2-3,-5 motors; or the 10.5 mm mini A1-3 motors, they'd be here now.

Bob
 
plano-doug said:
Bob,

You make some good points.

OTOH, these are BP motors - no one else is offering a BP F motor. Quest would have a market niche all to itself (for a while). And, IIRC, the Quest E motor is higher impulse than the Estes E. So they should enjoy some decent margin on these uncommon motors.

As for the hazmat, I agree, but that only applies to mail order. If they were sold thru brick-and-mortar shops, the hazmat would be amortized over many motors and present only a small adder per motor. In some cases, such as at Hobby Lobby for example, they ship from their own warehouses which should further reduce the per-motor hazmat fees.

My take is that the problem is likely more of an import regulatory headache than a profitability issue.

If the gov't (ATF or whoever) allows the D5's and D8's to be imported, the larger motors should get the same treatment, but they could indeed be looking at the amount of BP in the E's and F's and judging them to be somehow more of a threat.

I know it's illogical, but we're talking about the federal gov't, and they're not always so logical ;)

Doug

.
Click to expand...
Doug

There's no difference in import regulatory requirements and BATFE and DOT regulatory requirements for BP D motors and BP E and F motors with less than 62.5 g.

1.) Model rocket motors are NOT regulated by BATF regulations. The regulation (27 CFR §55.141) specifically exempts "model rocket motors consisting of ammonium perchlorate composite propellant, black powder or other similar low explosives containing no more than 62.5 grams of total propellant weight and designed as single use motors or as reload kits capable of reloading no more than 62.5 grams of propellant into a reusable motor casing.".

2.) Domestic shipping is not an issue. I am a signatory to DOT-SP 7887 and DOT-SP 10996 so I can ship both model rocket motors and high power rocket motors in commerce (common carrier). Quest Aerospace is also a signatory to DOT-SP 7887.

DOT-SP 7887 allows you to reclassify 1.4 C and 1.4 S rocket motors containing not more than 62.5 grams of propellant shipped with 1.4 G or 1.4 S igniters as 4.1 flammable solids and shippable via common carrier within the United States. https://www.phmsa.dot.gov/staticfiles/PHMSA/SPA_App/OfferDocuments/SP7887_2008040176.pdf

3.) An EX number for the propellant and the article is required for importation and transportation of Class 1 materials. This requires testing by a UN/DOT approved compentent 3rd party testing service, and acceptance of the testing by DOT. This is not difficult to obtain, especially for hobby rocket motors, but it does cost money. There are testing services in China, so the cost is not prohibitive, but is real.

4.) No vendor in their right mind should consider importing anything without doing a market study. The vendor must pay in advance for the rocket motors, the shipping and any testing services or import documentation preparation fees, and ee must pay customs duty prior to container entry into the US.

5.) All shipments from China are by container, so either he must pay for an exclusive container shipment, or use a freight consolidator to assemble a compatible full container shipment. Regardless, an upfront payment of many 10's of thousands of dollars will be required, and if the market is not there, the importer will not recover his costs in a reasonable time, if ever.

My guess is at the present time, there is not enough of a market to insure a profit.

Bob
 
bobkrech said:
Both Quest motors have more than 30 grams of propellant and and the F12 would have to have less than 62.5 grams. A full 40 Ns E motor would have 50 grams of BP and a 50 ns 25% F would have have the maximum 62.5 grams of BP. These BP motors are not mailable so how many folks would be willing to pay a $25 hazmat fee every time they order them, especially since AT has equivalent APCP motors that have not more than 30 grams of propellant which can be mailed via USPS without any hazmat fee?

I wonder what the real market is for these motors. Quest is currently having rocket motor made in China? To be economical, I think you would have to order a container load of motors. While there's a sufficient market for A through D BP motors, I'm not sure the market will support the bigger BP motors because of the inherently higher shipping costs. No good business person is going to import a lot of motors that may not sell for a very long time.

Bob
Click to expand...
Four words:

  1. staging
  2. and
  3. easy
  4. clustering
 
Peter Olivola said:
And how big do you think the market is for these uses in these sizes? The answer, in the grand scheme of things, is miniscule.
Click to expand...
I want E and F black powder motors for my FSI clone fleet. Quest already makes one in the smaller size (Quest 20mm D5 ≈ FSI 21 mm) and now I'd like to get some of their 28mm E and F motors (Quest 28mm ≈ FSI 27mm). So I would most certainly buy them if they were released for sale. I'm not an investor in Quest so it's not for me to figure out the size of the market and the profit point for these motors. I'm just a customer, and I am saying that I would buy them. I'm expressing a desire as a customer, not figuring out a plan as a product manager. That's all me, you or anyone else involved in this discussion can do, since none of us is involved in running the company.
 
Last edited:
The release by Quest of BP 'D', 'E' and 'F' motors may be tempered more by the change in ownership/management of Estes.

While Bill Stine had stated at NARAM-49 that these motors had been put on the 'back-burner' because of the economy, the importation of the motors along with all the associated paperwork/rules/regulations also was delaying the introduction of these motors.

Now that Estes is under new management and is planning to introduce composite propellant E-G motors, Quest may be holding off on bringing over the big BP motors.

For those of you attending NARAM-53, be sure to ask Bill Stine about the status of the big BP motors. ;)
 
Last edited:
Well I think I remember back a while that Apogee had 10.5 mm motors.

Andrew
 
MarkII said:
Four words:

  1. staging
  2. and
  3. easy
  4. clustering
Click to expand...
Those are uses, not market. The market is unit sales per year. Who many F12 motors will get sold per year @ $11 to $12 each? 5,000 or 10,000 max? That's only $5,000 to $10,000 per month revenue.

You can fit 250 F12s into 1 cubic foot, or 300 E12s in the same space. standard containers come in 20' and 40' lengths. Roughly 17,500 E or 14,600 F motors will fill 5% of a 20' container, or 2.5% of a 40' container. Based on the assumption above that quantity would be a 1.5 to 3 year supply, and would have a wholesale value between $25,000-$30,000. The contents of a filled 20' container could be worth as little as $500,000 to as much as $1,200,000 for a full 40' container. A smart vendor is going to make sure he get's his money back on his investment.

If I invest $1,000,000 I would want a minimum 10% annual return. If it takes 1 year to sell out what I bought, I want at least $1,100,000 back in my pocket after all expenses including my salary and benefits. If it's two years, I want $1,210,000 back, 3 years $1,331,000 back. If I can't do that, then I've lost money.

Bob
 
bobkrech said:
Doug

There's no difference in import regulatory requirements and BATFE and DOT regulatory requirements for BP D motors and BP E and F motors with less than 62.5 g.

1.) Model rocket motors are NOT regulated by BATF regulations. (snip)

2.) Domestic shipping is not an issue. I am a signatory to DOT-SP 7887 and DOT-SP 10996 so I can ship both model rocket motors and high power rocket motors in commerce (common carrier). Quest Aerospace is also a signatory to DOT-SP 7887. (snip)

3.) An EX number for the propellant and the article is required for importation and transportation of Class 1 materials. This requires testing by a UN/DOT approved compentent 3rd party testing service, and acceptance of the testing by DOT. This is not difficult to obtain, especially for hobby rocket motors, but it does cost money. There are testing services in China, so the cost is not prohibitive, but is real. (snip)

My guess is at the present time, there is not enough of a market to insure a profit.
Click to expand...
Okay, it's not ATF - it's DoT and BoE - but, either way, despite other motor vendors having trudged their way thru this, I can't help but wonder if the bureaucracy isn't a major factor.

OTOH, it's been a long time in gestation, long enough to have overcome any obstacles presented by this. So maybe it does come down to not being able to get a deal worked out that matches the min order size to the perceived market.

But, even then, one would think that a Chinese motor maker would want to make a deal to put some seed products into the market to see if it will grow in that direction. That is, you'd think they would want to make the deal happen to get some here and see for sure what the growth potential is. With no products on the shelves, no E/F BP motors, everything else (concerning the market potential), no matter how well deduced, is still speculation.

Doug

.
.
 
bobkrech said:
Those are uses, not market. The market is unit sales per year. Who many F12 motors will get sold per year @ $11 to $12 each? 5,000 or 10,000 max? That's only $5,000 to $10,000 per month revenue.

You can fit 250 F12s into 1 cubic foot, or 300 E12s in the same space. standard containers come in 20' and 40' lengths. Roughly 17,500 E or 14,600 F motors will fill 5% of a 20' container, or 2.5% of a 40' container. Based on the assumption above that quantity would be a 1.5 to 3 year supply, and would have a wholesale value between $25,000-$30,000. The contents of a filled 20' container could be worth as little as $500,000 to as much as $1,200,000 for a full 40' container. A smart vendor is going to make sure he get's his money back on his investment.

If I invest $1,000,000 I would want a minimum 10% annual return. If it takes 1 year to sell out what I bought, I want at least $1,100,000 back in my pocket after all expenses including my salary and benefits. If it's two years, I want $1,210,000 back, 3 years $1,331,000 back. If I can't do that, then I've lost money.

Bob
Click to expand...


How many motors will fit into a container is really irrelevant. Importers/exporters routinely mix shipments. A container can have a mix of all of the motor sizes that the vendor wants to import. Minimum order per item is the real key element in how many of a given size needs to be purchased. Most chinese manufactures that I have observed will have a 5000-10,000 pc minimum for small items. Of course the more you buy the better the price and the more items you get in a shippment the lower the overall unit cost.

The fact that that Zhongtian does not list E or F motors on their contact page makes me beleive that these motors may be a special order and that infact their developement may have been contracted by Quest. One would think that market research was done prior to contracting such development. My guess is that all of this was done before the economy tanked and Quest is now taking a wait and see attitude before proceeding. Given the current economic forecasts and a depreciating dollar this is probably wise.

None of that changes the fact that a 13mm B2 would be awesome and is near the top of my motor wish list.
 
bobkrech said:
Those are uses, not market. The market is unit sales per year. Who many F12 motors will get sold per year @ $11 to $12 each? 5,000 or 10,000 max? That's only $5,000 to $10,000 per month revenue.

You can fit 250 F12s into 1 cubic foot, or 300 E12s in the same space. standard containers come in 20' and 40' lengths. Roughly 17,500 E or 14,600 F motors will fill 5% of a 20' container, or 2.5% of a 40' container. Based on the assumption above that quantity would be a 1.5 to 3 year supply, and would have a wholesale value between $25,000-$30,000. The contents of a filled 20' container could be worth as little as $500,000 to as much as $1,200,000 for a full 40' container. A smart vendor is going to make sure he get's his money back on his investment.

If I invest $1,000,000 I would want a minimum 10% annual return. If it takes 1 year to sell out what I bought, I want at least $1,100,000 back in my pocket after all expenses including my salary and benefits. If it's two years, I want $1,210,000 back, 3 years $1,331,000 back. If I can't do that, then I've lost money.

Bob
Click to expand...
My job as a customer is not to figure out how Quest could market these motors and make a profit on them. My job is to decide whether or not I would buy them if I had the chance. My answer to that question is affirmative.

Even if I was to try to tackle the marketing question, it wouldn't matter since I don't work for Quest Aerospace. I can philosophize and speculate all day and it won't accomplish anything. Quest doesn't want my thoughts on their business plan, they want my business.

I would buy plenty of these motors if they were ever brought to market. That's the only meaningful information I can provide.
 
Do you hope to influence Quest in their decision making process? The answer is either yes or no. If yes, then it's been explained why your pledge of purchase is meaningless. If no, then what is the point of your post?

MarkII said:
My job as a customer is not to figure out how Quest could market these motors and make a profit on them. My job is to decide whether or not I would buy them if I had the chance. My answer to that question is affirmative.

Even if I was to try to tackle the marketing question, it wouldn't matter since I don't work for Quest Aerospace. I can philosophize and speculate all day and it won't accomplish anything. Quest doesn't want my thoughts on their business plan, they want my business.

I would buy plenty of these motors if they were ever brought to market. That's the only meaningful information I can provide.
Click to expand...
 

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