Because I am getting tired of seeing theory of Big Daddy Nose Cone design issues I am going to post the statement from Steve Kristal on the NAR FB page:
Steve Kristal,
I just asked Matt Steele who designed the kit. He flew that same nosecone on North Coast kits for years prior to the Big Daddy, and then for the last 22 years on the Big Daddy. He also flies a 2.6" cone just like it on his current kits. Ejection failure has never been a bigger issue on that nosecone than any other. Estes is crazy about safety. If that particular nosecone was an issue it would have been dealt with many many years ago. The urban legend on TRF is just completely unsubstantiated. You can find threads on TRF where people talk about modifying the cone but you're not seeing reports of numerous lawn darts. You are also not seeing them on Ye Olde. You don't see them on 20 years of flight logs (currently406 of them) on RocketReviews. And you don't see reports here. The Big Daddy nosecone is no more prone to failure to eject than any other cone.
My theory instead is this:
That the Big Daddy has a relatively large-ish volume to pressurize with enough gas to reach nose cone ejection pressures (compared to most other Estes Models) that in the event of a too snug nosecone fit it may not have enough gas to pressurize that volume sufficiently to pop the nosecone off, OR if there is an anemic ejection charge in a stock motor (not usually an issue in reloadables as its easy to add more powder and not too common afaik with Estes motors), and the few BD lawndarts I have seen have been with Estes D12 motors. That being said I have seen MANY Big Daddies flown with no issues and each time I hear about one here on TRF or elsewhere its quite often simultaneously posted to several other social media pages at the same time for example I have now seen one incident posted by the original flier on the Estes FB page iirc, it has since been posted here on TRF, the NAR FB page, and the Tripoli FB page.
My opinion is that due to this constant referencing of a few incidents then spreading them across multiple social networking pages awareness is being blown up over a few incidents. However there are A LOT of Big Daddies out there being flown and its not unusual to see a few less than optimal recoveries, I personally own 4 Big Daddies and fly them, one has even had two less than optimal recoveries (I do know/suspect the reasons for both). We are also a small community so the word gets around about a single incident (there are obviously more than one incident here, just sayin'). The Big Daddy is a great kit and an awesome flier, just like any other rocket the flier needs to pay close attention to prepping for recovery, I will continue to fly my Bid Daddies and don't give a damn about something I believe is on the flier and not the design of the kit. Do people actually believe that Estes would intentionally release a kit that had known issues, what happened to the ones that did...say like the old X-15 kit? Nuff Said.