I have to ask about your capsule construction. I have built many skill level 5 rockets...I am not new to modeling. But the capsule /tower assembly on my Redstone kit....nothing fit. The sections would simply not line up and it seemed like one panel was too wide for it to fit on the lower ring with the rest of the panels. The tower parts, if done by instructions, had angles that simply did not line up. It was a total mess on mine. So much so that I gave the whole darn kit to a friend. He supported my observations when he saw my kit. He is going to try and 3D print something to make it work.
Did you have any troubles? Has anyone had the same experience as I did with the capsule and tower portion of this kit? I LOVE Estes....don't get me wrong. But IMO...that tower/capsule assembly on this kit is a pile of junk. Please let me know how you did it!
Andrew
So, first you need to use Plastruct Plastic Weld (or something similar to it) as regular plastic model cement just won't do.
For the capsule, the instructions have you glue one section to the base then add the others. That won't work. You need to put all 3 on the base first without gluing. Trying to get them to fit properly requires you to put 2 on the base then fan them out from the top a bit to get the 3rd one in place and then "snap" them together. Once that is done, place the antenna housing on top to keep everything together. Then use the plastic weld and just run it along the inside seams of the capsule sides. Don't glue it to the base or the cap. Let it dry. Then you can go back and hit the rest of the seams and also glue it to the base. Don't glue the antenna housing to the top though.
For the towers, yeah that was a pain. The inverted V's on the bottom of the pieces don't lock into place of the antenna cap at the start. Only the left leg of each does - after those are in place then you need to gently bend the right leg. So, take 2 of the tower pieces, brush some plastic weld on the knobs and connect them while making sure that the left legs of each one are aligned on the holes of the antenna cap. Don't glue to the cap, just hold in place. Also you can place the LES motor bottom on top of the knobs on top to make sure they are properly placed - don't glue that though. Once they are set, you can add the 3rd tower piece. Again, brush plastic weld on the side knobs, attach, and make sure that now all 3 pieces align over the left holes in the antenna cap and that the LES motor bottom fits on the knobs on top, again not gluing it. Once those are set you can glue the antenna cap in between the tower pieces in the holes. Let dry. Then it is time to attach the tower to the antenna housing. Brush plastic weld into the 3 holes that the left V's will go into install them and hold until set. Then wait until completely dry. Then, one at a time, brush weld into the right hole of one of the legs and gently push it into position. Hold until set then let dry completely! Do each of the other legs the same way waiting after each one until completely dry. Then brush plastic weld onto the inside seam of the cap and the housing to lock it all in place.
After this, you can work on adding the LES top which is a piece of cake.
Something to keep in mind is that if you paint the tower pieces first (like I did) you need to make sure that all of the paint is scraped away from the knobs and the holes (apparently I didn't) in order to make sure the plastic weld holds well. Otherwise the weld will not hold (as was my first, second, and third cases).
