What did you do rocket wise today?

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Today I finished my first HED rocket. I had read posts on how others had done but when it came right down to it I had to invent my own way. I trimmed some of the bottom off the nose cone and made a coupler that was a little narrower than the shoulder. I cut two pieces of coupler and glued them to the av bay as a stop so that the av bay didn't get blown into the nose cone. The rocket is a 4" airframe with a 19.5" nosecone. It's 55" long and weighs 82 ounces. It has 3 fins that are 1/4" lite plywood, TTW. A 54mm mmt. I'm calling it Head Case.
 

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We got round 1 of the bat virus vaccine today, handily next to a Hobby Lobby. And I was thrilled to find that they carried a good line of Createx airbrush acrylics, so I now have enough to start airbrushing rockets. I have two in the build pile, and I'm hoping that a mist of white followed by flourecent orange and yellow will make my Odd'l Cyclone highly visible without weighing it down much.
 
Continued the effort on the cheap box of Estes Vikings and pretty much got this ready to go. Just a tiny bit of touch-up left. If my memory on the math is right, this little D-Region Tomahawk should be basically 1/11 scale (BT20 tube). The only non-kit pieces are the fins; used some balsa for those. But, fin gussets were cardstock from the fin sheet and everything else is Viking underneath. Took two kits to get the body tube length, but that's ok, the extra nosecone from one of those went into another creation from the bulk pack.
 

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I received the Aerotech Phoenix kit I purchased on eBay. Looks like it's in good shape. Though I do wonder about these. 27 ribs in a backed marked with a big number 5. I'm thinking they don't belong.

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Launch Report from 04/17/21

Estes Mini Mean Machine - A10-3T - Success. Good flight, good landing, downscales are at least as fun as upscales.

NewWay Cornered - 2X C6-5 - Failure. CATO on both motors as far as I could tell. Probably from the same batch that blew in my Fat Boy at Red Glare. I don't have any more C6-5's so next time I'll have fresh ones. Rocket is okay.

Estes Sasha - D12-5 - Success. Dang this one got up there even without the booster. I was really glad too that I flew it without the booster. It almost landed in the trees and landed about 20 feet short of the trees with the wind blowing directly into them. I had actually resigned myself to losing it when I was watching it come down and was elated when it dropped below the treetops and was still clearly in front of the tress.

Fliskits Deuces Wild - 2x B6-4 - Success. Good flight with twin smoke trails.

NewWay 2x4 - C11-0 to A8-5 - Partial Success. Something happened at staging and the sustainer took off sideways and almost hit the ground before the parachute came out. Not a total success but the rocket is okay so I'll take it.

Fliskits Diminutive Deuce - 2x MicroMaxx II - Partial Success. Good flight with both motors lighting, less-than-ideal landing with the streamer failing to come out of the body. The rocket is fine though.

Sunward Penguin - C11-5 - Success. Built by my wife. Good flight but I wish it had landed just on the near side of the irrigation ditch rather than the far side.

Fliskits Goddard L-13 - C6-3 - Success. Flies really nicely but I think the -5 would have been too long a delay. I was really happy not to lose any of the styrene rail pieces.

Boyce Gemini-Titan - 2x D16-4 - Failure. Parachute on top part did not open, parachute on bottom part did not come out. Probably left the parachutes packed for too long. Repairable but still depressing after anticipating flying this for so long.

Estes Little Joe 1 - C5-3 - Success. First successful flight with a C5-3 after two failed ones. Good flight with good landing that left the tower intact.

LOC Deployer - G75M - Failure. Stratologger CF worked perfectly but main parachute did not open and rocket hit the ground hard. Fins have broken plies and will require repair. Probably going to replace the parachute with a thin-mill one that won't have to be compressed as hard to fit into the short payload tube.

Dyna-Star Flamethrower - 2x E12-6 - Partial Success. Too-hastily adding the chute release was probably not a great idea. The chute release opened as it usually does but failed to release the parachute. Rocket is miraculously intact though.
Wish I was there to see this event. Where was the Llaunch site? Is the G75M a reload or single use High Power motor?
 
Wish I was there to see this event. Where was the Llaunch site? Is the G75M a reload or single use High Power motor?

The G75M is a single-use Aerotech DMS motor. Since it doesn't produce more than 80 N of average thrust, it should be attainable without a high power certification. It's a nice motor and I'm a big fan of the Metalstorm propellant.
 
Not sure what you mean- I'm in the process of building the 2 Cool for Spool, I'm aware of the LOC spool, but I don't tend to source things by the spool.

Sorry, my picture was a bit busy. I was meaning the sort of industrial cotton thread spools/bobbins in the picture below. The wide conical base might be OK for base drag stabilisation, although the "body" might need extending a little bit.
Might make an interesting little project I can do later.

Spools for Starstreak.jpg
 

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Sorry, my picture was a bit busy. I was meaning the sort of industrial cotton thread spools/bobbins in the picture below. The wide conical base might be OK for base drag stabilisation, although the "body" might need extending a little bit.
Might make an interesting little project I can do later.

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I see it now, no I haven't found/used any of those spools- I'll be interested to see what you do with it...:)
 
I received a 38mm aeropack motor retainer, tested the fit on my Loc Terrier booster, and started spreading rocketpoxy on the motor mount rings. I have to finish this kit because I need the table top space for something else.

Standing upright so the epoxy dries where it should on the MMT rings.E5BCAA33-B958-4A49-AD9D-2BD5BEECEC19.jpeg
 
Got some more rocket parts in the mail. I think that was the last of them, so I guess it's time to start building. I was hoping to have a little CNC router to cut fins, but I haven't pulled the trigger on that yet - Dremel tool to the rescue.
 
I always wake up earlier on the weekends than weekdays. Kinda hate it; I could use the sleep. But, at least I can get some stuff done by 7am and having a shop 120' from the house means I don't wake the family.

Sanded primer and shot paint/clear on a replacement body tube for our lawndarted and crumpled Estes firestorm. Easier with a tube not attached to the rocket. Plastic fin can FTW! This one doesn't need to look perfect; it's just a fun flier.
Sanded my Baby Daddy scratch build and put another layer of sandable primer on it.
Tested some paint options for the above rocket to figure out how to finish it.
Taped my cluster motor project for some finish painting - maybe today I'll get to that.
Checked that my soldering job on a cluster whip was good and conductivity is what I hoped to achieve :) Best to be sure before clipping all 3 igniters, right?
Lubed the chain on the MTB since I'll probably ride later...oh, wait, wrong thread. :)
 
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