Two scratch builds

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krislhull

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Finished up the basic build on two scratch built scale sounding rockets today. As a lover of all things classic sounding rockets, especially the Astrobee D, many of what I build are sport scale models of various sounding rockets. I am currently working on slowly building a 2/3 scale Astrobee D custom kitted for me by MAC Performance, as well as recently completed a Aerotech Astrobee D. While looking at those two rockets, I decided I needed a smaller one, so I drew up a roughly 1/6 scale version. At 1/6 scale, the airframe should be 1" diameter, and from looking at the offerings from Balsa Machining, the Centuri ST-10 tube is a near perfect fit, and 1.04" diameter. The nosecone was picked up from Semroc at eRockets, and a 18mm motor mount came from them as well. Fins are cut from 3/32 balsa.

Now, I mentioned 2 scratch builds... While getting the measurements for the Astrobee D from Rockets of the World, I saw the Sandia Tomahawk. I currently have 3 versions of the Sandia Sandhawk built and waiting for their maiden flights, all from LOC: the 1.5" parkflyer, 3", and the 5.5", which is my L3 project. I figured the Sandia Tomahawk would be a good project for a similar scale to the small astrobee. BT60 tubing gives a roughly 1/6 scale. Nosecone was purchased from Rocketarium, as well as the 24mm motor mount, and the fins were cut from 1/8 balsa.

I am now waiting on warmer (and dry) weather to paint these two.

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Real rockets have 4 fins. :goodjob:

1. are those fin guides in back made of plywood?
2. did you buy mixing cups by the hundred?
 
Real rockets have 4 fins. :goodjob:

1. are those fin guides in back made of plywood?
2. did you buy mixing cups by the hundred?

The larger fin guides are plywood. I received them as part of the 2017 TRF Secret Santa. They are custom made for my LOC 5.5” Sandhawk build, and they will work on any 4 fin 5.5” LOC kit.

As for the mixing cup, I just buy 100 or 200 count sleeves on Amazon when I need more. It looks like I have a bunch because I have 2 different sizes. I’ve only had to buy more once.
 
Now that I am back on my days off from work, I painted the two rockets over the past couple of days, and then today applied decals to them. The Astrobee received paint and decals according to Alway's Rockets of the World, and the Sandia Tomahawk was painted the same, and I added a Thiokol logo decal for looks. I still need to fix the paint on the nosecone for the Tomahawk, as I could not get good results on the HDPE cone from Rocketarium. As hard as I tried, I could not get primer or paint to stick right to it. I have a balsa cone on order to replace this failed attempt.

The decals are my first attempt at printing my own, and I am very pleased with the results. the Sunnyscopa paper is a little on the thick side after a couple light dustings of clear coat, but they look great, and are easy to work with.

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Of course, since these are two scratch builds, I decided to make up decals stating that they are custom rockets from me...

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