Your most jinxed rocket what is it?

When I became a BAR one of the first rockets that I tried to build was an Estes Solar Flare. About the time that I started building it, the family got a new puppy who I found out really liked to eat balsa and cardboard

Attempt#2: Bought a new kit and tried again. While trying to insert the 13mm motor mount in the sustainer, the wood glue grabbed before I got it into place, and I damaged the tube trying to get it out.

Attempt #3: Found a piece of (25 year old) 13mm tube from the remnants of my Estes Javelin that got partially crushed over the years and decided to use that as a replacement. The rocket looked good on the launch pad, and lifted off straight, but when the rocket staged, that old tube shredded and the motor went up through the sustainer shredding the recovery system. ALSO - One of the bystanders said that they thought they had heard the motor CATO, but I was sure they must have been mistaken...

Attempt #4: Rebuilt the rocket again and tried again. Rocket launched fine, staged fine... BOOM. CATO of the second stage motor (from the same batch) spitting the nozzle out the back end, hitting two of the fins on the booster and breaking them.

Attempt #5: Rocket has been rebuilt again, but has not been launched... YET!

 

Mine is the Estes Magnum. I built one back around 1991-ish, that staged fine but lawn darted on the maiden flight. Tossed it in the trash out of frustration. Fast-forward 25 years or so and I built a clone from scratch. On that maiden flight, the C11-0 booster CATOed, leaving the rocket in a burning heap and was later repaired. Finally flew fine the next several flights but last year the booster stuck on and got toasted from the sustainer motor. I also built a BT-70 upscale that uses 24 & 29mm motors, that one didn't stage and lawn darted in spectacular fashion... on it's maiden flight.

Seems every Estes Magnum I build needs at least one rebuild before it will fly.

 

Oh my, If I still had Semroc, I'd have to send you another one after you tried so hard to repair it each time.

 

My cursed model is an Estes Baby Bertha that has survived 3 catos, two being the full split-casing sideways blowouts that make holes in the outer body tube. It's on its 3rd motor mount and 2nd paint job already.

 

That would have to be my very first Big Bertha.
Every time I launched it, it landed in a tree.
The last time I lost it it arched over off the pad and went over a large grove of pine trees.
Never found it.
Had 8 retrievable tree landings before that.
I've had about 4 or 5 BB's since.
Sold my last stock built one.
Currently building a 24mm one with a pointed nose cone.
Mark at Sticker Shock made the decal for it.
Bullet BooB Bertha I called it.
Nose Cone is painted like...well...like it's name sake.
Decals should be here today.
Pictures will posted when done.

 

Mine would be the Estes shuttle. I have had 3 cato all on their first flights and the last cato blew my jolly logic chute release to pieces.

 

Estes Vagabond.
Bought 3.
Built 3.
Lost 1, 1 CATO'd, 1....disappeared....literally.

 

Estes Goblin. Built it 6 times when I was a kid and teen. Never had a successful flight and recovery. Frist one Cato, second Caught fire on recovery and came down in a ball of flames, third the dog ate, rebuilt it launched it , no ejection charge never found it, fifth fell out of my back pack on the way to launch field and ran it over with my ten speeed. 6 Lost it in a field of sagebrush after launch found it 4 month later as a bright yellow spot in the field as the snows were starting to melt.
I have built 6 as a bar all in different colors , never flown any of them but three have suffered major damage from getting knocked of the shelf, one got stepped on by my wife.

 

So far, my simple little Estes Crossfire ISX. Yeah yeah....I know. I can't seem to get paint to like this thing. My paint on this one is white primer, white glitter, clear. The first time I applied glitter, it shrunk the white primer underneath because I was impatient and left cracks everywhere. So I sanded it back and started over. This time, it all went smooth, even made it as far as putting on the first coat of clear. This time, there was a quarter-sized patch in front of the launch lug that mysteriously turned gummy and peeled off. Like, completely off....I could clearly see the tube underneath. Everything else is hard as a rock and glassy. So, once again, I sanded back, blended the edges of the peel, hit it with primer, and waited a full 48 before attempting a dusting of glitter...which I did this morning on my way out the door for work. The nosecone and nozzle were painted with the same process, and look incredible.

My kids both got Generic E2Xs (They're 2 and 4, so I let them help glue, pick out colors etc. They are the reason I'm using glitter...son wanted green body with blue nose/tail, daughter wanted purple body with pink nose / tail.) My son's went without a hitch....my daughters had some minor paint problems but it's fixed now and almost caught up to his.

If all goes well, we should be able to apply decals tonight/tomorrow and fly on Saturday.....but we'll see.

 

Estes Wizard. I don't think it's possible to fly those with the stock streamer and keep the fins on.

 

Got this one ready for decals... should have 2 more tomorrow:

edit: this was supposed to go in the "what did you do today" thread....oops

 

2" Talon. Once I added about 8" to the front it at last would fly straight, before that it would leave the rail and immediately "take a left" and sail downrange. Last flight ended up about 80' up in a tree, finally got it down, I think its retired for good.