Hi all. Although I've lurked here for a year now, I have posted but once. So, to help break the ice, I thought I'd post a spring build thread.
For Christmas I was given a nice selection of kits. One of them was Sunward Gravity Rider. After reading the review on RocketReviews, I learned the rocket was grossly over weight (or under powered). Others have decided to cluster it. I instead thought I'd just try to lighten it up.
The kit comes with 3x 18-inch RT56 tubes, 3 plastic NCs with canopies, 2 short sections of RT50, some laser cut balsa fins, and a 18mm motor mount. Seems like a perfect collection of parts to work with.
I asked the resident rocket designer (my 7 year old) for some ideas. He thought Sunward's original design was really cool (I guess I know who selected this present) and it shouldn't be changed. After showing him the math, he agreed that it had to be lightened but we should still try to keep as much of the original design as possible.
We decided to drop the 3rd tube and nose cone. This might drop the weight by 3 or more ounces. Then we decided to build a "side-by-side futuristic space fighter" which maintains quite a bit of the tail design.
After angle cutting the bottoms of the RT56, they were glued together side-by-side. In order to make for a more sleek look, the boss had me glue some card stock to the tubes to smooth out the transition. The little sections of RT50 will cover the aft end.
Upon advice of the chief designer, the sections of angled RT50s were then glued to the pair. The lengths and orientation was adjusted from Sunward's original just because we wanted to.
The kit comes with 3 pairs of laser cut fins. However, the left over triangles look like they might be useful too. I'm expecting the rocket to end up a pair of wings, pair of elevons, and some more drag strategically placed to increase the coolness. Unfortunately, the boss is playing at a friends house so this decision will have to wait for a while.
________
Jaguar xjr-14
For Christmas I was given a nice selection of kits. One of them was Sunward Gravity Rider. After reading the review on RocketReviews, I learned the rocket was grossly over weight (or under powered). Others have decided to cluster it. I instead thought I'd just try to lighten it up.
The kit comes with 3x 18-inch RT56 tubes, 3 plastic NCs with canopies, 2 short sections of RT50, some laser cut balsa fins, and a 18mm motor mount. Seems like a perfect collection of parts to work with.
I asked the resident rocket designer (my 7 year old) for some ideas. He thought Sunward's original design was really cool (I guess I know who selected this present) and it shouldn't be changed. After showing him the math, he agreed that it had to be lightened but we should still try to keep as much of the original design as possible.
We decided to drop the 3rd tube and nose cone. This might drop the weight by 3 or more ounces. Then we decided to build a "side-by-side futuristic space fighter" which maintains quite a bit of the tail design.
After angle cutting the bottoms of the RT56, they were glued together side-by-side. In order to make for a more sleek look, the boss had me glue some card stock to the tubes to smooth out the transition. The little sections of RT50 will cover the aft end.
Upon advice of the chief designer, the sections of angled RT50s were then glued to the pair. The lengths and orientation was adjusted from Sunward's original just because we wanted to.
The kit comes with 3 pairs of laser cut fins. However, the left over triangles look like they might be useful too. I'm expecting the rocket to end up a pair of wings, pair of elevons, and some more drag strategically placed to increase the coolness. Unfortunately, the boss is playing at a friends house so this decision will have to wait for a while.
________
Jaguar xjr-14
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I think the original Canaroc design might have been BT-50 based, which would have been fine with single 18mm power, but the upscale needs a cluster or at the very least 24mm power.
