Rocketry Thwarted By Rainy Day

Well, it's raining today, so I can't finish painting my rockets. And since I need to take the car in, I can't drive to the hardware store for things to finish a couple other rocketry projects I have. Bleh...

The one thing I can actually start today is assembling my guillotine fin jig. I'm excited about this thing, as it should assure that I get my fins on perfectly straight every time.

But, man, I'm so close to finishing these rockets, and since it's been three weeks since I started them, I'd like to put them to bed.

Here's a list of rocketry projects I'm either working on, or planning:

• Assemble the guillotine fin jig
• Construct a camera tripod mounting system to use as a launch pad
• Build my own launch controller
• Finish painting and stickering my two rockets
• Build a cradle to hold rockets in construction
• Build individual crates to store and carry individual rockets (I've already roughly designed these)
• Build my Estes Big Bertha, 3D Rocketry Nautilus II, Quest Magnum Sport Loader (my first cluster rocket, with two motors firing at once) rockets
• Find out what the hell happened to my Red River Rocketry Blue Shift rocket (the USPS tracking claims it was delivered to my door, yet I do not have it in my hot little hands)
• Find the perfect tool box to use as a range kit (all the stuff you want to take to the launch site - motors, wadding, pliers, bits of sand paper, etc.)

Some people enjoy lists, so there you go.

Rocket Build - Estes Crossfire ISX

I've been building rockets for about two months now. Unfortunately, I did not document my first build - Estes' Der Red Max.

 
I hadn't realized how obsessed I'd get with building rockets. But with my second build, I started photographing most of what I was doing. Here's my second build - Estes' Crossfire ISX. Notice I did a different paint job than the standard - to differentiate from Chad's Crossfire.

Here, you'll see my first mistakes - which I learned from, and happily did not repeat on my second build.

Enjoy the obsessiveness!

Oh, Noes!

My brakes went out when I was leaving for work this morning. I recently got my car worked on after letting it sit for about ten months, and it was so nice to be able to drive places again.

The reason I mention this here is that one of the first things I thought was Dammit! I was going to go launch rockets today!

My first couple of rocket launches with Chad were back when I was walking everywhere.  I live on the east side of Bloomington, and we launch in a huge park on the west side. Maybe it seems silly, but once I had my car back, the most satisfying part was that I could drive myself to launches, and to the huge hardware store and Michael's Crafts across town to buy building supplies.

And the weather has been so great this week! Today would have been my first time launching in weather that wasn't sweltering and humid.

I hate hot weather, especially humid weather. September and October are the perfect months for me in the Midwest. This indicates how awesome launching rockets is - I'm willing to slather on sunscreen and stand out in humid, 90-degree weather just to watch them go up.

I've gotten used to walking everywhere over the last year - I didn't even mind the polar vortex, because I bundled up tight, popped in the earbuds, and listened to podcasts during the 40-minute, 4:30 a.m. walk to work five days a week.

But this... This is a bummer.

I'm nearly finished painting and building my two most recent rockets - the Estes Cosmic Explorer and Estes Hi Flier.

Cosmic Explorer - a sleek-looking rocket that stands two feet tall

Hi Flier - 12 inch rocket which goes up to 1,500 feet

I just need to do some sanding on the paint job of the Hi Flier to knock down some tape dams - raised areas of paint caused by masking tape - and do topcoats and decals for the Cosmic Explorer, and I'm done. I've been working on these rockets for three weeks now, carefully trying to get details right, fill wood grain properly, and fixing a few things I messed up. I'm still working on the details of making a rocket look as good as it can.

But this workday - and the walk home - were so long, I might have to lie down before doing any sanding or painting. I want to get right to work on these, but I think I get sloppy when I'm too tired. I'm working on being patient to get the best results.

Just a couple previews:

I've opted for my own color scheme for the Hi Flier - blue and gold. Chad has one in the traditional color scheme (actually, had. He lost that one.), and as I've said before, when he already has a rocket, if I get the same one, I like to make mine look different. I thought of the Blue Angels when I was coming up with ideas:

But I'll probably skip the sticker. I am not a huge fan of self-adhesive stickers, and I usually get them on crooked, and there they stay.

And I've managed to put a pretty decent airfoil on the fins of the Cosmic Explorer:

This would have been easier to see if I'd taken a closeup later, after priming
the rocket. I'll post pictures of the whole thing when I'm done.

OK. Time to nap, sand, and paint...

Finally, Good Painting Weather!

It really feels like September now! It would be great launching weather, but the field where I fly is swarming with soccer kids this weekend. But it's a great day for painting!

The last couple weeks, it's been humid or rainy in central Indiana, so I've had to wait. And I've been working on two simple rockets for about three weeks or more (these are only Skill Level 1 rockets, but I've been trying to take my time and get the details the way I want them), and I'd like to put these guys to bed.

I did another primer layer on my Estes Cosmic Explorer and noticed some of the carpenter's wood filler (CWF) in the body tube spirals hadn't been all sanded off, but since I've had problems over-sanding and scuffing up the body of the rocket, I decided that was OK for now.

And I started the top coats of paint on my Estes Hi Flier - which I am not doing in the standard colors on the package. I've opted for blue and gold, a kind of Blue Angels theme. Chad already has one of these anyway, and when we both have the same rocket, I like to make mine look different from his.

I created a new page on the basics of how model rockets work so I can freely write posts in this blog without feeling I need to explain everything. You can find it in the side bar, or just click here.

So Much Support and Help

The Rocketry Forum is such an awesome website, and such a good resource, especially for rocket n00bs like myself.

I posted a thread about my frustrations with surface preparation I mentioned here yesterday, and got tons of advice and help. I already feel like I have a better grip on what I did wrong on this build.

This forum is a really supportive community of people who are obsessed with rocket building, which I need, because most of my friends don't really care.

I am actively trying to find some nerd to discuss rockets with, especially since my rocket buddy Chad will be moving to upstate New York for most of the year - and he doesn't really care about the finer points of rocket construction, anyway. But at least I can talk to him about it, and when I build a really nice looking rocket, he appreciates its quality. I talk my girlfriend's ear off about my rocket building. She's very kind about it, and listens, and even offers some advice, but she really doesn't care about the whole thing. She's just glad I've found something I'm passionate about, and doesn't complain too much about the clutter on the dining room table - unless it's there for too many days in a row.

For now, I'll settle for this awesome online community. Check it out, fellow rocket n00bs. It's really helpful. I already feel like an expert at things I knew nothing about a month ago.

Super Frustrated, Super Excited

Gaaah!

I'm in the process of building my fourth and fifth rockets, and man, am I frustrated. Not with the basics - I got that bit down. I know how to assemble a rocket, and I've made a couple cool ones that turned out really well. If the average person looks at them, they won't notice the flaws that are bothering me so much.

What has me super frustrated is my finishing technique. There are lots of rocket builders out there who get the most amazing finises on their rockets. I mean, these things are basically made out of cardboard and balsa wood (which is really grainy wood), but some people make them shiny and smooth like sports cars! I've been working on getting my rockets smooth, and trying to get some of them shiny (shiny isn't always what you want - real NASA rockets are not shiny, for example; they're flat.), and all of them smooth.

Part of this is for aerodynamics. A smooth rocket has less drag. But for these little models, that's maybe less important than for a high powered rocket. Still, for me, it's the craft of making a really nice looking rocket that is so satisfying. I've been told by a few people on The Rocketry Forum "calm down. When you're on the flying field, nobody's going to notice."

Which is true. But to me, a nicely built rocket is more than a thing that will go up and come down. They all do that, if you follow the instructions and build them with just a tiny bit of competence. For me, though, a nice rocket has a sculptural quality. They're beautiful. And I know the flaws are there when I build a rocket.

So, for fellow rocket n00bs: the body of the rocket is made out of a rolled paper tube - a kind of carboardy thing that looks a bit like a paper towel tube, but nicer, and usually with a waxy coating. But, you know those spiral grooves on a paper towel tube? Those are still there in rocket body tubes.

A lot of people who put care into their rockets fill these in before painting, because they will show through the paint job. Not a huge deal, but if you know you can get rid of them, and make the rocket look like it's not made of cardboard, it's pretty cool.

A lot of people use a wood putty like Elmer's Wood Filler. This is also great for covering up the wood grain on those balsa wood fins (another thing I haven't gotten totally down). You fill the grooves with a little of this putty, maybe thinning it out first with a little bit of water. Then, when it's dry, you sand it off, and the whole body is smooth and even, and then you put on primer and paint.

Problem is, when I sand down my fillers, I seem to oversand. Like, I scuff up the body tube and get all these... fuzzy bits... that drive me... crazy. Then, they will never go away, and your rocket has little hairs on it once it's primed, sanded and painted.

I thought I'd figured out a workaround. On this little rocket I'm building now - an Estes Hi Flier, which is supposed to go up to about 1600 feet - I primed the rocket first. Then, I applied filler. Then I sanded the filler and primer together last night. I figured the primer would act as a nice buffer to prevent me from shredding the paper in the body tube.

Today, I thought I'd try to make the rocket a touch smoother by wet sanding with a little 400 grit sandpaper - this is pretty fine, for you fellow n00bs - and I did it again!!

Look closely - you'll see the shredded paper from the tube.

This drives me so crazy! I was so careful - I barely touched the thing!!

I thought, well fine, this rocket will just have a few fuzzies. So, I went on to putting on a layer of white primer over the sanded gray primer, and discovered that the filler hadn't even filled in all the grooves properly!

It's fine. It's OK. The rocket will still look good.

But, GAAAH!!!!

This little filling-after-priming trick of mine feels like a cheat anyway. Not that there's any such thing as cheating; in rocketry, if something works, you do it. But lots of other people seem to be able to fill and sand their body tubes with nothing on them, and get decent surface to paint onto. A guy I've talked to online says he doesn't even bother filling in the spirals on a small rocket - but that guy builds the most beautiful high powered rockets, so I can see why he wouldn't bother when he puts together the little paper ones, because he knows he can do it if he wants to. For me, this is part of the learning process, so that I can build up to something bigger, and I'm trying to get this craft down. I've built several rockets now, and learned a lot, and improved my skills at certain things, but this one area... just has me stumped!

OK, enough about that.

Why I'm super excited: I just got my first shipment from Apogee Components, a great model rocket supply company. If you're a n00b like me, you should check it out, if only for all the great instructional newsletters and videos on the site.

A week ago, I got my first non-Estes rocket, a beaut from 3D Rocketry called the Nautilus II.

It was really well packed, but the US Postal Service crushed the box a little bit, and upon close inspection, the body tube had been slightly crimped in the middle. So, I ordered replacements from Apogee. I also ordered the coolest thing: a guillotine fin jig.

This thing helps eliminate crooked fins, and keeps you from having to hold them in place with your hands until the glue sets. It accommodates lots of sizes of tubes and thicknesses of fins, and it's a masterpiece of rocket building equipment design.

The box from Apogee was really well packed, and even included a free instructional DVD on the basics of model rocketry. Apparently, you get a new DVD with each of your first four purchases over 50 bucks!

I can't wait to put this fin jig together, and use it on my new 3D Rocketry Nautilus II.

But before I do that, I HAVE TO STOP GETTING THESE DAMNED FUZZIES ON MY TUBES!!

Since I started this blog, I've been either too tired from work, or too busy working on or reading about rockets to actually post anything. And I've gone from knowing nothing and having done nothing to acquiring a lot of new knowledge and having done a lot of stuff, and it kind of reminds me of when I've written in journals every day for weeks, and then stopped. Then a lot of stuff happens. Then I think, Do I do a recap? For, like, posterity?

Well, I'll probably get to that. Since I don't know who, if anyone, will actually read this, and a lot of people I've told about my rocket obsession have a lot of questions - "How do they, like, work?" "Do you, like, throw them away after you launch them?" -  I'll probably start simply. Apologies to any advanced rocketeers (yes, that's what they're called) who stumble upon this blog in the early stages. I'll get more technical as I go on.

Anyway, since this is a rocket blog, I should probably start by showing you some rockets. These are the ones that I first bought. Just to kick things off.

My first few were ready-made rockets which required little or no assembly. The very first was part of what's called a "launch set." This includes a launch pad, a launch controller (a little electronic box with a couple of buttons on it you push to make the rocket launch), plus an easy-to-assemble rocket, all for less than the price of a pad and a controller you'd buy separately. I got this exact one as a kid, and never put it together.

I'm not wild about the rocket, partly because it included stickers. The kind you can't move once you've touched any part of it to the rocket. This is what messed up my toy Millennium Falcon when I was a kid. It's called the Silver Arrow:

I mean, the thing flies great. But it's mostly made of plastic, and I didn't get any of the stickers on straight. I even messed up the purple underneath by trying to adjust one:

Also, one of the fins fell off a few days ago.

Anyway, not to complain. It's a cheap kit I got for about 20 bucks and I've used the launch pad for much cooler rockets since.

Next, I found a bunch of premade rockets on clearance at a Michael's Crafts here in town. This was before I became obsessed with building my own. These are all Estes rockets. For years, Estes was one of maybe two or three model rocket companies, and they're still probably the best known. Today, if you're starting out, and Googling "model rocket," Estes is about all you'll encounter at first. But as I've discovered, there are a lot of great, non-Estes companies who also make rockets.

These are actually all great, and fly really well.

This is the EX-200. It's a tiny little thing, and when you load it, it's packed so tight, you think it might just explode. But it doesn't. It flies fast and straight, and pretty high, on a tiny little A motor. Cost me 4 bucks!

Motors, in large part, are labeled by letters. A is the least powerful, and they go up by each letter. This is n00b information. I'll elaborate later.

This is the Patriarch. 7 bucks. I love this thing. It flies really straight, and it's heavier, so you can really watch it ascend. Some of the lighter ones go really high, but in less than a second it's so high you can't see it any more.

I nearly lost this one on the first launch, because the shock cord (which holds the nose cone to the body of the rocket... if you don't know, I'll explain later) wasn't securely tied. So the body came crashing down (it was fine) and the nose cone drifted across the fields on its parachute and was nearly lost, before being rescued by the 5-year-old (Cody), who was with us. Whew!

Estes Athena. Awesome rocket. Flies really high. This was either 4 or 7 dollars (I forget which). The bottom sticker comes off a bit - I need to tape that down one of these days.

I used this rocket for a little experiment I'll detail in a later post. Let's just say, it was a successful experiment I'm pretty proud of.

This is the rocket that gave me the bug for rocket building. It's a re-release of a classic Estes rocket called "Der Red Max." The design is based loosely on the look of the Red Baron's airplane, and the thing is freaking cool. Nice, thick airframe. Awesome decals. Black and red look. And the ascent is awe-inspiring. The kicker is the skull-and-crossbones parachute.

I saw this rocket on Amazon for about 16 or 18 bucks, and they only had one left at the time. I was worried about building my own, but it was too cool to pass up, so I bought it. I followed the instructions, and loved the process of gluing and priming and painting... I was terrified I'd get the fins on crooked - in fact, you have to look really close to see that one is slightly to the fore of the others, but it doesn't interfere with a great flight - and I was terrified of the decals. But I did some research, took my time, and it came out great. This is my baby.

Here are some more views of the decals.

As you can see, I did get a little chip in the paint job from a hard landing after the parachute melted to itself:

After building this one, I started researching how to get a better finish. Up close, this rocket has a lot of texture you might not want. And you can see the wood grain in the fins. I found out that you can fill that in with a few techniques. My second build was Estes Crossfire ISX. I built this one because Chad had one, and it was the first rocket I'd launched. We lost his first one after the second launch, and Chad got a new one.

The crossfire is supposed to look like this:

It's the color scheme Chad went with. I wanted mine to look different, and once I realized you can make a rocket look any way you want, I decided on my own paint job. (Besides, Chad's paint jobs are terrible. He rushes them, has no patience for "craftsmanship," and he uses paint brushes. Paint brushes, for crying out loud!!)

Mine looks like this:

I contacted Chris Michielssen of modelrocketbuilding.blogspot.com, a really gifted rocket builder, for advice on this nose cone color I had in mind. He had a tip or two, but said it would be pretty tricky. When I sent him my pictures, he posted them on his blog. I totally geeked out in nerdy pride over that one!

I also rounded the leading edges of the fins and moved the launch lug (I'll explain later, fellow n00bs) for greater aerodynamic performance, so that my rocket could defeat Chad's rocket in a competition. We finally did this on Sunday, and I think they were about equal. From where I was standing, mine appeared to go a bit higher. From where others were standing, his did. But we were all really too close to the launch pad to tell.

Here's a detail of that cool nose cone mask I did:

My most recent competed build was a cheap, impulse buy. An Ested Mini Honest John, which is a scale model of an early U.S. nuclear missile. I got it because it looked cute on the package, and was about 9 bucks. I considered this a practice rocket, since what I'm working on now is mostly my finishes:

These are all "Skill Level 1" (according to Estes) rockets, which means that they require the least amount of experience building model rockets.

I'm currently building two more rockets and have three I haven't started, plus one on the way in the mail. I'm just about to bump myself up a skill level, people!

Well, there you have it. Rockets.

I know this entry was pretty long, which is probably some kind of blogging crime, but I'm new to this. Just figured I should actually show some rockets on my new rocket blog.

Here's the whole (completed) fleet: