This is where I'll put pics of my rockets, etc.
My 'family' pics are on the 'personal pics' page!

My Scratch built rockets!
for now these will be all my scratch built rockets, they are the more interesting ones anyway! (everybody knows what Estes kits look like...:-)

This is my first scratch built rocket… pretty nice? You can get a feel for the size because of the 6in ruler next to it, really it’s quite small. As soon as I had gotten my first Estes rocket, Tidal Wave, and launched it I started on this, finished it and launched it shortly thereafter, the fins immediately peeled of but other than that everything went OK. On our way home we stopped at the library and I got a book on model rocketry (they only had two), and learned about the positioning of the grain so it runs along the leading edge of the fin. I re-glued the fins and have launched it a few times since-all successes (so far as I remember). Considering I knew absolutely nothing about rockets at the time, that’s not too bad!

This is also a pretty neat rocket. My brother and I designed it during our ‘naptimes’ (more of a quiet time for mom than for usJ), built it and didn’t tell anybody till we were done. This was my ‘big rocket’, and it was pretty impressive. Just so you don’t start thinking that I did something that worked great first try with almost no idea what I was doing still, I’ll give you a few of my ‘mistakes’ that I made on this. For one, I had a pin sticking out the top (thus the name star piercer). I have since removed that. I also had pitifully small fins made from cereal box type cardboard, I recently replaced those with larger balsa fins (as shown in picture) and it is (according to the swing test which I learned how to do) stable. After these two modifications, I thought I was ready to go and just recently launched it (I hadn’t launched it before I learned the do’s and don’ts of rocketry better, and had modified it accordingly). The motor mount gave out (I had overlooked that when re-vamping the rocket), so this summer I put a new, much stronger one in and hope to launch it soon

Star Piercer - lift off on a C6-5

Let’s start off by making it clear that this isn’t the next rocket that I built, there were 2 or 3 Estes kits and a few (4-5) other scratch rockets in between. Also it was in this time I got ‘G. Harry Stines 6th edition Handbook of Model Rocketry!’ a really great book. In this book I learned about the stability, aerodynamics, launch systems, recovery, design and construction of model rockets. This model is over-stable, but I didn’t find that out till not too long ago. I have launched it some 3 times, all flawless except one that it landed in a tree because of slight weather-cocking. When I got it out of the tree and tossed it to the ground it broke off a fin (it ripped the body tube, the glue joint stayed intact!) I re-glued it to launch again. I brought it back in a suitcase from Romania (I made it and a few others which I didn’t bring back while in RO) the body tube (which I rolled myself from paper) is very thin, and now has a number a wrinkles, so it might collapse sooner or later but for now is good to go again!.

RO rocket launching.

Also a rocket I built in Romania, It had a small light bulb as a NC but it broke the day before I was going to launch it. I then replaced the light bulb with this test tube. I launched it once, and it flew fine. I built this one based on mini (13mm) engines and I wanted it for altitude (min diameter, medium length and stable). It was (and is) all those. It could be a little more aerodynamic, but such is life.
8-25-04- ok, so I recently broke the test tube NC, as well... but never worry, there now sits on top of this rocket a FROG! It’s really cool, and flies great... the frog came from a pen we have had for a long time, there is no limit to what you can use in rocketry!

Hearshy Kiss launch pic.

This is a cool rocket! I also built this one in Romania, and it shows some of the travel wear but all in all this is a neat rocket. I named it ‘Trabant’ after the German (and no, they don’t speak German in Romania, they speak Romanian) word Trabant, which means satellite. Trabant is also a small kind of car in Europe. I wrapped the payload section (just big enough to hold an 18mm standard motor) with aluminum foil, and at first it looked good but it has gotten wrinkled since. It has been launched a few times and, other than a separation once, everything went OK.

Trabant launch pic.

Back in the States, after we got settled, I got all my rocket stuff out that had been in storage for two years while we were gone, and did an inventory. With my ‘new knowledge’ that I had gathered while in RO I looked over my models and finished/tuned up my different ones. Then I got SpaceCAD; that was the next step in my rocket ‘career’. This rocket is my first design using space cad, and I made it with altitude in mind. It has a wax cone that I made and I launched it (just the upper stage) on an A10-3t, I was a little skeptical because of the small fins and I thought of it as a test for SpaceCAD, flawless. Nothing went wrong. It boosted straight up, and landed some 40ft from the pad. I haven’t launched it double stage yet (SpaceCAD says 2600ft, and what SpaceCAD says is law, so I want a big field and no clouds; with a little rocket like that…. Well you can imagine!)
Well, I launched it on my Bday. we got the booster back but the sustainer (upper stage) never stopped going for all we know:-)

Match… what a rocket! This rocket was built with performance only in mind. It is truly a great looking rocket from my point of view though. I just built it this summer, finished it the end of July. It has a very sleek finish, done with a type of varnish that worked very well. The fins may look ridiculous, but it has a ton of nose weight. This weight (and low-drag) allows it to keep its momentum after the engine burns out. An Estes E9 gets things going, and that 4oz slick-as-glass rocket just keeps going up! (At least I hope so…) So long as my first flight goes OK, I’m going to be entering this rocket in a contest to win my next year’s NAR membership free!

In the second picture of Match, you can see its recovery system. The recovery system consists of an Estes 24in parachute and a streamer. The streamer (which should be below the parachute so as to avoid tangling) is just for looks, I wanted it to just have a streamer but it was a ‘bit to heavy’ for that. Sleaping next to the rocket is 15 year old Ben, who just passed on the end of this summer.

'Snow Storm' takin to the skies!
This is a pic of my rocket launching/b-day party. It is Snow Storm taking to the skies on an Estes E9-4. The flight wasn't flawless, but it was pretty good. the only problem I had was with the recovery, and everything went well enough that the rocket is still OK.

This is a very interesting rocket. Powered by 2 mini A’s, nose-blow recovery and I have no idea if it will fly straight or not! I hope so, but SpaceCAD won’t calculate something this weird. The tube is oval shaped, and so I tried to make the fins different to compensate, but I don’t know if I did it right at all. If anyone would like to give me a few tips on building rockets like this… send me an e-mail!

This rocket was started last fall/winter, almost a year ago now, but since it isn’t done I didn’t want to put it before my others. Construction is being held up because of the lack of the Aerotech G33 that I need to finish it. I hope to finish and launch it by spring/summer next year. I don’t have any deadlines, why rush??

The Second pic is just to show the strength that I’m trying to give it. You can see the loops I sewed into the end of the 9/16in tubular nylon shock cord to make them strong, and then I hooked bolts into the upper bulk plate and the upper motor mount center ring to which the shock cord is attached by those clips and there is a 600# test swivel for the parachute to hook to on the shock cord. As you can see I riveted the coupler for the NC to the NC, I used 3 rivets and I think that will be very strong, even stronger than it really needs, but since it was easy, why not?

Big Bry at its current residence, right above my bed! (Sweet dreams...:) It looks almost just like it will when finished, but the fins and motor mount aren’t glued in yet.

My Green Bay Packers rocket!

Packers rocket liftoff on an A10-3t.