Estes Gray Hawk #2068 Restoration

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Back_at_it

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It's time to start another one. With the Black Brant II in primer and waiting for a decent day to paint, I've decided to start another restoration. This time we're starting with an Estes Gray Hawk. Unlike most of my previous restorations, this kit was actually one that I bought, built, flew a lot and managed to hand onto while I bounced in and out of various hobbies.

While this kit does have some bumps and bruises and two of the wings have broken off, I managed to hang onto all of the parts. There is clear evidence of repairs on pretty much every part of the rocket so it's time to give it some much needed attention. The paint job on this one clearly shows my work at the age of 15. This was hand painted with flat white and gray. The fins are not sealed, thin and sloppy fillets and just a lack of detail on anything. Would be nice to be 15 and carefree again.

I didn't keep flight logs back in the day but I can recall launching this one at least a dozen times maybe more. It was a great flier on calm days but didn't like the wind. We only had to retrieve this one from a small tree once when it weather cocked and took off for the other side of the field. The parachute is missing and the old shock cord is rotten into pieces so that will all need to be replaced.

Pics 1 thru 3 - This is the Gray Hawk as she has sat for close to 20 yrs. Two broken fins but otherwise intact. Lets get started.

Pic 4 - After about 30 mins of pulling, scraping, and cutting, we have a mostly disassembled Gray Hawk. I was able to remove everything I wanted including the motor mount and the original shock cord mount. Just soak the shock cord mount with a damp paper towel for a few min and it peeled right up. I'll leave the main body section together as it is very strong and I don't really want to reproduce those paper pieces if I don't need to. As a kid I was clearly obsessed with glue as that stuff was everywhere.

Pic 5 - Here we see the disassembled parts all sanded and down. The excess glue on the tubes and fins came off pretty easily. The rest was carefully removed with a Dremel and/or various grits of sandpaper. From there I cleaned up the edges of the fins and prepared everything to go back together.

That is as far as I got last night. With the weekend here, I'm going to try to make this a quick resto and get through the bulk of the reassembly in the next couple of day. I'm currently looking for a warm place that I can paint indoors so I can wrap up some of the other restorations as I'm getting tired of looking at rockets in primer..

Until next time.

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From the rear I took a hobby knife and made a score around the outside of the centering ring where it meets the body tube.

Next I a dripped a small amount of HOT water inside the tube and let it run down on top of the mount.

I waited about 10 mins for the water on the inside to work then dropped a few drops on the rear and let it sit for a minute or two.

at that point the entire mount came out. I did the same process to remove rings from the motor tube.

I know that I used elmers glue back in the day. it doesn’t matter how old elmers glue gets. A little bit of water and it softens right up
 
From the rear I took a hobby knife and made a score around the outside of the centering ring where it meets the body tube.

Next I a dripped a small amount of HOT water inside the tube and let it run down on top of the mount.

I waited about 10 mins for the water on the inside to work then dropped a few drops on the rear and let it sit for a minute or two.

at that point the entire mount came out. I did the same process to remove rings from the motor tube.

I know that I used elmers glue back in the day. it doesn’t matter how old elmers glue gets. A little bit of water and it softens right up
Damn...
 
The paint job is going to be difficult. I’m not sure which way I want to go. I’m completely open to suggestions. I’ve looked for other
Builds but have come up with very few.

I’m thinking I might go back with a version of my old grey and white but I’m also kicking around the idea of a grey and dark blue combo.

Any ideas are welcome
 
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Back with a small update. Since the motor mount is out of the Gray Hawk I figured I'd give it a little bit of an upgrade and put it back together using plywood Centering rings. I figure I'm only doing this resto once so.... Lets use the good stuff.

Pic 1 - These centering rings came from BMS. I used an Dremel tool to grind a small notch in the lower ring to clear the motor hook. While I'm at it, a thrust ring will be added for positive motor retention since the motor hook is already kinda loose from years of service.

Pic 2 - Here is the completed motor mount complete with fillets and 200# Kevlar leader ready to go back in. I've moved the aft centering ring rearward about 3/4 of an inch to add additional strength to the motor tube and lower portion of the body tube. No point in it being so far forward. The Motor hook was also lifted and a a bead of CA was laid down under the top part above the plastic retainer.

Pic 3 & 4 - Here I have started reassembly. You can see a little filler work was done to clean up some of the gaps around the rear before assembly began. This was done with Bondo brand Spot Putty. The areas where the fins attach were all cleaned up with some 400 grit sandpaper to give a good solid surface to bond to.

Here you can see the upper twin tail fins attached. This was done with Tite Bond II. Also in Pic 4 you can see where the inside of the main body tube has been given a coat of thin CA to help prevent any issues with dents or zippers.

That was it for yesterday. I'm going to get the remaining fins attached today and get the first fillets on.


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Made good progress today. I've managed to get the remainder of the fins attached and do the first of two rounds of fillets. The first was done with Tite bond II and is pretty much dry. I'm going to do the second fillet tonight with Thick and Quick then start sealing the fins. Since there is already paint on the fins, I'm hoping they will only need one or two coats to be smooth.

The motor mount was put in place as well so that piece is done.

Here is a pic of todays progress.

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Made good progress in the last couple of days on this project. Managed to get the fins sealed and the rocket primed.

Side Note. I'm really happy with the new sealer I'm using. I had been buying balsa sealer from the online rocket retailers until I stumbled upon Minwax Sanding sealer. Quart can is $15 by me an will probably do every rocket I will every own. Two or three coats and it's like glass.

After sealing, I managed to get two coats of SEM high build primer on. While there is some sanding to do an a little bit of filler work, I think it's looking pretty good so far. I'll need to cut in the details around the cockpit windows before the final prime but it is getting here.

Still kicking around ideas for paint but I'll come up with something.


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It is an interesting kit. I've seen that nose cone on another kit too but I just can't remember the name.

Great work in restoring it. I'm following your process.

-Bob
 
It is an interesting kit. I've seen that nose cone on another kit too but I just can't remember the name.

Great work in restoring it. I'm following your process.

-Bob
The Shuttle Express and AstroSat LSX.
 
The astrosat nose cone is actually bt56. This is bt55. While they are close, they are not exact but You could easily clone this using bt56 for the main tube and no one could ever tell.
 
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I got one of the nose cones in an Estes Designer's Special back in 2001 and built a scratch build I called the Marauder. It got treed on an early flight and I bought an AstroSat LSX to scavenge the cone. I used a BT-55 on both, but substituted a Sunward BT-56 cockpit cone on the AstroSat once I built it. Strange set of circumstances there.Marauder.jpg
 
Made some more progress on the Gray Hawk. While I haven't decided on a final paint scheme, I have decided that the first color is going to be Krylon Metallic Aluminum. Sprayed on three lights coats for a nice shine and smooth finish. This one might drag out a bit as I work through the paint scheme a bit more.

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It's been in the single digits here in Chicago so it's been a bit cold to paint. I think I have the paint scheme figured out. Now I just need to do a ton of masking and painting.

Same boat here in Madison. I've got three on the bench that don't even have primer. Based on when you did the aluminum I figured you were farther south.
 
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