Once I got all the tubes in I had a thought. Back to the "pile" I went..Came out with a broken center drill with a nice 37 degree taper. Cut the tubes about 3/16" above the top CR and along with a plastic mallet and a steel backer block did some good ole fashioned Peening. Turned out pretty damn good, they're actually in tension (sound like guitar strings) and nice beveled edges for easy care and feeding. 
Fin(s)! Luckily Dave @ Loc was adept enough to save me from myself by making my new fin set with extra long tabs. Odds of me getting an accurate dimension that would work on all 6 tabs were virtually zero. Now it's a simple manner of dropping each fin into it's respective slot, scribing a line @ the fin/tube joint, subtracting the difference and cutting off the balance. Unluckily for me, when the "inlaws" stopped by for a few days all of my stuff was banished from the house (personally I find it flat out stupid that we feel the need to "pretend" we live differently than we actually do) to the non climate controlled garage. End result was as expected, my fins warped somewhat severely. I'll get 'em straightened out though. The 'ol damp sponge and heat gun trick hasn't failed me yet. Can't wait to test my MonoKote ing skills. Looks like it should be fun/interesting/challenging/frustrating all at the same time. Gotta kinda do things out of order though. Wouldn't care to attempt applying it around 6 fins.
That looks really great! I’m so far behind on painting, and there is dwindling warm weather with the fall approaching. I’m convinced I’m going to have to give this a try on a mid power rocket.
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Skipping ahead a bit, I've been thinking about how to best utilize all that space in the nose cone. Obviously it's gonna require at the very least some sort of adjustable nose weight system for optimized flights considering all the possible combinations with 7 mmts at my disposal. A while back I designed a system for my Estes Scion that was built as a single deploy rocket. The original intent was to utilize a hot wire/cutter chute release but it turns out it's also just as handy as a tracker only bay (there's pretty much no metal in it)or tracker/logger bay. I've adapted it to several other nose cones since it's absolutely easy to set up and use. It consists of a section of Bt-55, an Estes 29mm motor retainer and a small piece of plywood for a cap.The sled carries an Eggfinder mini, an Eggtimer Quantum (not in the pics, "borrowed it for another project) and currently a 450 mah Lipo, altough I have had an 800 in there as well. I found that I couldn't fit all that in a 29mm tube so I upped it to Bt-55 and everything fits, albeit tightly. A lathe is pretty much a requirement to pull it off though since the i.d. of the retainer needs to be opened up substantially. A small section of 3/16" brake line makes for a nice streamlined static port that has just flatout worked everytime. All you do is plug in the battery(s), drop it in, screw on the cap, wait for gps lock, arm the Quantum remotely @ the pad and fly. Move it from rocket to rocket at will since there's virtually no attachment, it's held in compression by the cap. In the larger size nose cones there's also room for a drop in nose weight tube. Pretty sure I'll use the same setup here even though it's not really needed due to the fact that I already have a full size av bay. An extra tracker can't hurt and I see no point in wasting all that real estate. 
Do you by chance have a finished weight? Also, don't forget that I've added a chunk of weight about as far back as it can be...
Were you lighting all 7 @ the pad? I'm planning on airstarts only, the more the merrier. Don't think I can source a motor that'd safely lift it but it would be very cool to launch it on a high initial thrust central motor and attempt 3 pairs of airstarts. And since Marsa recently came out with the Gyro-1 tilt module I should be able to do it safely. Worst case would be launch on 3 and do two pairs of airstarts.
AT I205 has "about" enough initial thrust (maybe). CTI makes an I224 that looks promising, 433 N almost immediately. These are currently nothing more than guesses until I get an actual built weight. I did add quite a bit from "stock". Was thinking alternating white and black smokies would be a neat effect. Especially if I could pull off 3 sets with max delays
. I'm sure it won't be easy but that's exactly why I want to attempt it. Trying to stick mostly to single use motors (hardware costs) but not against buying a case for a BIG central re-load.
Weight is 5.75 lb. completely prepped except motors. Pretty much stock except altimeter bay at base of payload section and a single layer of 4 oz tip to tip on the fins. (They are bad about flutter.)
I have a 60" Spherachute in it. They are measured over the top of the canopy so probably close to a 48" from other vendors.
With 7 composite motors, I usually light 3 on the ground. I have used a single center motor (H399, I200, I204) and air started 6 Estes F15s for a low flight. I have Thermalite, so I just fuse the outboards to the ground start motor(s).
Parachute! Yay....Was at my local Menards the other day picking up some material for a truckless friend. Whilst impatiently waiting in a checkout line I discovered this in the impulse buy display/checkout line/cattle herding section. . It did not state the size on anything I could find and not wanting to open it in the store (already have several lifetimes of bad luck) I "impulsively bought it. Turns out it's about 48" across the flats so should be just about right. It does have vents near the top (not sure what, if any affect they'll have) and i'll also 
probably do a spill hole so looks like some testing'll be in order. I'll probably just fly it in a similar weight tougher to destroy fiberglass rocket with a logger to get actual decent before trusting it in my Ultimate. Was a bit pricey at $11 (I normally get the 60"ers from Home Depot for $5 and cut 'em to size) but I like the alternating color scheme.
). Started by using the 'ol dirty hands and printer paper rubbing trick (remember when I said measuring should, if possible, be avoided?) to get accurate dimensions. Since the motor mounts are not "perfectly" aligned/spaced and the inserts were a press fit between them I had no room for error. After said pattern was made, I simply laid it on a piece of .125" aluminum from the "pile", center punched the centers and drilled 'em out. Didn't feel like doing a bunch of setup on the mill so I took the lazy way out and just grabbed a die grinder and eyeballed it. I hate when I do that, It never leads to time saving, always the opposite. Now I'm gonna end up doing it twice since I'm not happy with the result. It'll work as is but I just don't like the sloppiness. On the brighter side, I already have a pattern...I used 1/4" nylon spacers to get the inserts all to the correct depth and glued the whole mess up with JB Weld..Whole thing, including hardware came in at just over 15 grams. Trying to come up with a simple, lightweight way to add wire retainment to it for airstart igniters. Any ideas anyone? 
