nike smoke color

Anybody have reliable information on fin color for the Nike Smoke. The few images (of the real vehicle) I have seen seem to have the three orange and one yellow fins. They do not appear flourescent. Help?

Thanks

I forget the details, but if you want to be accurate, you also need to find out the "rules" for which fin is painted and how the "United State" decal is placed. As I recall, the decals read side-ways and one reads top-to-bottom and the other reads bottom-to-top.

To the best of my memory (don't trust):
- There is one yellow fin and three red. ... I don't have the Pantone colors.
- The bottom-to-top decal is placed to the right of the yellow fin.
- The top-to-bottom decal is 180 degrees from the other decal.

Note - there are more than one "factory" paint job for the Nike models....this seems to be the most popular.

Stolen from Cosmodrome Rocketry's instructions:

4 Paint as follows:
a One Fin: Fluorescent Yellow.
b Three fins: Fluorescent Red.
c Nose cone inlet: Black
d Rest of the model: White
5. Decals:
a. Cut out the two “UNITED STATES” decals as close to the letters as possible.
b. The first “UNITED STATES” decal should be placed on the body tube 8 1/4” from the aft end, centered between two
fins, to the right of the yellow fin, reading “UP” the body tube.
c. The other one is placed on the opposite side of the body tube, reading “DOWN” the body tube.

-Aaron

Model Rocketry magazine had an article by G. Harry Stine -- check out pg 11 of the pdf on ninfinger's site.

Stewart32 said:

Anybody have reliable information on fin color for the Nike Smoke. The few images (of the real vehicle) I have seen seem to have the three orange and one yellow fins. They do not appear flourescent.

Click to expand...

I just checked my 1/3 scale Nike Smoke, and double-checked it against the drawings in "Rockets of the World", third edition by Peter Alway:

Three fins are Fluorescent Red
One fin is Fluorescent Yellow.

The inlet pipe in the nose is painted black.

The "real" ones flew on a T 220,000 motor

Glen Overby

If you have any images of the real rocket, you can scan, and then sample with photoshop to find out the R,G,B values (of the scanned photo at least) and then go from there to have a custom paint made etc...

Thanks... doods

I am in the process of making a miniature 1/30 scale nike smoke. Plans came from the Seattle Rocket works originally, I think. Someone on the web has the plans archived for general private use. Do a bit of a google, it shouldn't be too hard to find.

It had one drawing showing the rocket from two orthogonal perspectives, and detailing all the paint colors for the fins. Sounds just like what you need.

https://www.oldrocketplans.com/srw/srwNS/srwNS.htm

Lots of other nice plans on the site as well.

Stewart32 said:

The few images (of the real vehicle) I have seen seem to have the three orange and one yellow fins. Thanks

Click to expand...

You've seen more than one color image of a real Nike-Smoke?

May I ask where?
I posted here all my Nike-Smoke photos a while ago.
Dang if I can find them now.

Heada has the colors correct, it might also be of interest that the white is semi-gloss. rather the gloss.
Nearly all the sounding rockets that used Nike boosters were from US ARMY stores which came in Army Olive Drab.
they were sprayed or roller coated other colors at the assembly range..Wallops, White Sands..etc. usually in a hurry which is why we see the cradle marks in Olive drab on nearly all nike booster NASA sounding rockets

My Nike Smokes Range from minimum dia. .281" micros. to Quests 1/12th model. I think my favorite scale is the 1:30 scale 13mm (BT-5) base model converted for Micro motors. The launcher is all Scratch built based on the Launched at Wallops Island. For performance (Micro that is) the T-3 (.375") model is a very nice size

Okay, some serious thread necropsy here, a search turned this up and as I'm getting ready to paint the fins on my 4" Madcow model, at least Rusto doesn't seem to have a "fluorescent red" (anymore?), it's "fluorescent red-orange". Should I be looking for some other brand of paint (or maybe a different line than this one?) or would that still be the right color? I've used their fluorescent yellow before on another rocket so I already had that paint handy, and already have their white primer on the fins. Thanks.

Testors?

ChrisAttebery said:

Testors?

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Testors has some Flourescent oranges in their Model Master line that spray with a airbrush very nicely and don't have the rough surface associated with rattle can flourescents, however if you want them matte they need Testors Flat clear coat.

Sorry, don't have any (and don't really want to get into) airbrushing equipment. Looking for something that works as a rattle can.

Rustoleum red-orange is as close as you're going to get, I think. I've always used it on all of my scale sounding rockets from that era. As others said up-thread, there was a lot of variation in the actual vehicles.

I have used Valspar flourescent red and yellow paints for my Estes PSII Nike Smoke. The red worked well, but yellow by its translucent properties took a bit more
work. I don't know if Michaels even carries Valspar any more.

The NAR Technical Services scale pak for the Aerobee 350 sounding rocket includes a photo of a worker using a spray gun to paint the flourescent fins on the Nike
booster. No masking or any nonesense like that. You will see some boosters or vehicles that aren't painted well. The colors were for visual tracking and roll rate,
hense the one fin of a different color. They were not painted for aesthetics or top workmanship. The booster was painted like they did the Nike Smoke motors.
In NAR competition we always stress that you finish your model to the data that you have, either written or photos. Older photos may have the color shifted due to
age or printing issues.

If for sport, follow the suggestions offered in the previous posts and do what works for you.

Chas

You can also change the way the color looks by using different color base coats. Plus that also helps with coverage. Flourescents are always hard to get even coverage, just like metallic or candy apples.

Buzzard said:

The NAR Technical Services scale pak for the Aerobee 350 sounding rocket includes a photo of a worker using a spray gun to paint the flourescent fins on the Nike
booster. No masking or any nonesense like that. You will see some boosters or vehicles that aren't painted well. The colors were for visual tracking and roll rate,
hense the one fin of a different color. They were not painted for aesthetics or top workmanship. The booster was painted like they did the Nike Smoke motors.

Click to expand...

Heh. I like that, I'll have to remember that one if it doesn't turn out well. This is purely for sport, but I figured since I was building my first scale kit I'd do the best within my capabilities, as noted on another thread I even made a jig to sand the "proper" modified diamond shape into the fins rather than just using the flat fins as Madcow provided them. So I'll go with the red-orange and see how it turns out. I am going to mask however, or else there will be color EVERYWHERE. My painting skill isn't anywhere near that good.

This is what I used on my PSII Smoke. I think it turned out pretty well; the texture is a little bumpy but it looks fine from a few feet away.

Great information, thanks!

This thread was marked as me having posted to it. For the life of me I couldn't remember posting to a Nike Smoke thread any time recently. Yeah....14 years ago. I don't feel bad for not remembering.

I replied and can't remember that. I never did get to make the 1/30 scale NS. I did make a half-scale though!