This page is a work-in-progress--KP

At-a-glance information:

This page describes my love of Model Rocketry. Once bitten, you never really stop, although I had several, several year absences. I have rediscovered the hobby again with my son, who loves it. Some other sites would call me a "Born Again Rocketeer", or BAR, but I disagree--I never lost the faith! (Above, the 1972 Estes Rocket Catalog)

One thing I have noticed, this hobby is alive and kicking. Seems there are alot of BARs and NEAR BARs in this hobby. The net is loaded with people like you and I! I will be posting links for these as soon as I have more data and a conversation with these guys. Suffice it to say that a few minutes on the 'net and you will find companies that provide replacement nose cones, Estes style, body tubes cut how you like them, even replacement plastic parts. Amazing.

I thought I was the only one planning a SUPER GYROC. Seems like 3 other people have done this that I have found, some more successful than others. Watch this site, as I have already started my Super Gyroc, which is rather large. Stay tuned.

Left: Some of the Collection, March 2004

News, 08/31/2007

Stunning! Over three years since I added anything to this page, and almost that long since I have flown rockets.

Been busy with quite a lot. Most hobby monies have gone into electric R/C plane flying, which has been awesome. Totally enjoyed this and I feel like I am probably a solid intermediate class flier. I have yet to graduate to 4 channel and 3D flying, but we are close. I have also collected an entire vintage 3D "studio" comprised of camera, projector and various accessories to create 3D projected images.

Importantly, in 2005 we moved into a new house in the next town over. It is over twice the size, over 3000 square feet vs. 1500, a huge lot, plenty of concrete and back grass for the minibike, a place for the full scale spaceship (web page coming on that), cars, etc.

I am also building my dream workshop. This is a portable building that I am constructing this fall. It will be fully air conditioned, and fitted to support both automotive work as well as hobby activities. This is way better than having to clear off my work desk. I will post workshop pics as we go along. There will finally be a facility that will contain all tools, documentation and parts for both rockets and RC planes. Most automotive parts will be stored in other outbuildings on the premises.

Bad Cox News

Maybe everyone knew it, maybe it's me that is just so behind the time. I have been ordering replacement parts for my control line planes that I have enjoyed over the past few years (see more control line items in the Cox section). It seems over the year that there have been less and less Cox engines and parts available from hobby stores or calling them direct.

Last month, I finally got someone from customer service who really knew what she was talking about. I am sad to report these findings:

1) Cox no longer makes ANY engines. In fact, they have not for years. They have been selling off old stock. About the only thing they have left is literally thousands of the Snap Start .049 engines. Even though you can still buy the last of the helicopters, the cheaply made Comanche model, they don't even have rotor blades anymore. You break one, too bad.

2) They are only selling off the old stock of the gas stuff. The machinery they had to make the engines never really survived moving to Colorado.

It's the end of an era, and it's sad

Cox appears to be focusing on the "hobby" as they state, and that appears to be elecric park fliers.

New(er) Purchases

At a hobby store near my parents I picked up two of the limited release new Orbital Transport kits. Here is my slightly rough original Orbital Transport. Never did get the shuttle unit to fly right, it would just flutter every which way upon re-entry.

	In August 2007 my son came up to me in a hobby store, while I waited in line, with a new Interceptor. It is now part of The Collection. It joins the Interceptor 2 I bought about a year ago.
	In August 2007 my son came up to me in a hobby store, while I waited in line, with a new Interceptor. It is now part of The Collection. It joins the Interceptor 2 I bought about a year ago.

News, 07/11/2004

New Super-Gyroc Flies!--Yes. This weekend was amazing. I first flew the SuperGyroc Saturday with B6-4 engines. This was a mistake. Such fin mass makes for a heavy bird, and the B engines did not have enough time to get the bird very high. It came down HARD on the nose, but it did spin well! C6-3 engines were used today, Sunday, and it flew perfectly. It still does come down pretty hard, but no damage or even scuffs in the soft grass. I did it again!!!!

News, 07/3/2004

Cineroc Arrives!--It's an amazing day. My good friends at OldRockets pointed me in the direction of one very smart Cineroc flier named Daniel, who set me up with a never used Cineroc camera. My dream of owning one is complete, and my son is over the top delighted.

Cameron Begins Solo Build Project

My son has helped me build the Mosquito (lost, see below), a new Big Bertha, Alpha III, and Quark. We are in the middle of building an Alpha I, and he decided that he wanted to 'clone' an Estes Sprint. I still have my original instructions, and I downloaded shroud and fin patterns. My son is working hard on cutting out the fins (the original were die-cut) and carefully sanding them. I am proud of his work! Here is what he has so far:

New in the bag Mosquitos, Streak

Picked these up for fun--

News, 06/13/2004

Tragedy Strikes--Mosquito Lost

I made a pact with my son NOT to lose ANY rocket. But we did. Sad to say, our jointly built Mosquito project was lost on its first flight. Rocket went up, popped its engine, and I followed it down, only to find that I had followed the ejected engine! Hours of looking did not turn it up. Although there were trees that ringed the park--and possibly the rocket flew into them--it was a short grass park with no sign of the rocket. Sigh.

I had even painted it the Estes catalog colors. Interestingly, when I shared this story with other rocketeers, it seemed that losing Mosquitos is quite common. There was supposedly even a NAR event where 200 people launched theirs (it was called a Swarm!) and, get this, only got a handful back. Rumors of what happens to these rockets are abundant. No one knows the answer.

News, 05/05/2004

Updates: A "new" Saturn V Semi-Scale found... items to add to the picture above!

Talk about amazing. While on an internal household trek to find my old rockets, I came across a box with a few bags in it. Inside I found:

1) The lower stage, never flown, of my Apogee 2-Stage rocket.

2) The clear payload and balsa adapter of my original X-Ray, lost first flight. I guess I got the payload section back on the chute, and lost the lower part and the nose cone. I did not remember this.

3) Lower portion of my Saros. Just have to add the top portion and I will fly it again!

4) This is amazing: I found the original card and wrapper of my lost Saturn V Semi-Scale, but, unbelievably, I have a whole other one! I must have felt bad losing it and purchased another, but I forgot! I started the (poor) paint job on it, but the glued on paper panels are salvageable. Further, the engine mount and plastic fin mount unit is in, and the paper engine nacelles are not badly done either! Also, I wrapped the delicate nose cone with balsa tower in a paper towel, and it's perfect! I am only missing the plastic sheet for the fins. Where could that have gone? See pictures below:

5) A mid-80s Estes Catalog

6) My Honest John Kit! I will refab the wrecked paper shroud and continue with this build started 20 years ago!

7) My Skydart original engine ejection pod, the "new" wing I made for it (25 years ago!). All I need to get are the decals (underway with scaling them now and figuring a way to print them), body tube and nose cone.

8) Various other documents, instructions and pieces. Vintage parachutes, lugs--long ones, TA paper adapters, etc.

The Rocket Collection--1969 to Present

Alpha	First rocket, several flights, lost nose cone, may still have rocket, missing
Big Bertha	Most successful rocket ever owned, still have, great condition, added 2nd 18" parachute. This was built by my dad in 1970, survives today and we flew it last year (2004).
Mark	Lost on first flight. I didn't even remember this until I found the package. It might be nice to remake this one some time.
Beta	Broken fins, but have both stages. This is not in good shape at all. The kit was designed for the Short Engines. A kit was available to adapt to the then-new mini engines, but of course, that adapter would not work for the bottom stage, as it was too long.
Scout	Thought I still had this, cannot find it--poor build quality
Orbital Transport	Flew some, small shuttle never flew well, broken wings
Sprint	Lost in a swimming pool
X-Ray	Bumbling with cement for clear payload caused me to fog the whole plastic section. Then I lost it. This was the BIG XRay, not the little one. I thought my dad had found it, but realized he was just holding the sunglasses he dropped. They were later sat on by Ed Simocat.
Honest John	1/2 built, stopped when I screwed up the paper shroud with glue
Goblin	Only D power rocket I ever had, flew only twice, will not fly again, almost lost twice too! Found it blocks away from the field, neatly sitting on its fins on the sidewalk, no breakage. 1/2 way decent build job on this one
Mini-Bertha	Better build job, flew a few times, does fine.
Aerobee 300	Top portion blew off to infinite, still have bottom section. Not too good build quality.
Birdie	Dad hated this, but I insisted on having it, one of the first kits I built myself. I just flew this a few weeks ago!
Custom Design Number One	Built with the ugliest blunt knob nose cone Estes had at the time. Also, used "canards", which made the model so unstable it zoomed all over the place. Ended up connecting the canards to the fins to make one contiguous fin x 4, model still corkscrewed but flew--into the clouds forever.
WAC Corporal	Ended up on the roof of a nursery in Schaumburg Illinois. Another reason that Schaumburg Illinois can f#ck off, among many.
Custom Design Number Two	Dependable big BT-60 Body tube and C6-5 power, along the lines of Big Bertha, flew tons, still have, needs fin repairs.
Starlight	Tons of fins, OK build quality, my dad SAT on it in the car. Can't get mad at Dad, he started me on the hobby and paid for everything. To make it worse, big fat Ed Simocat where my dad worked sat on my dads 1945 Ray Ban Sunglasses in the same car, same week. Ed Simocat worked for my dad, and one day, disappeared. Dad is still waiting for Ed's reports.
Gyroc	Never finished, decided to restore and fly--See restoration below
Apogee II	Did a good job building it, fired just the top stage, lost it. Can't imagine actually flying it two stages. 5/5/2005 update: Found lower stage! Do I go back and rebuild this, and paint the original colors I did back then?		use 150 hori
Saros	The first model that was built as perfect as possible. Beautiful result, spray painted exactly as shown in catalog, lost first flight--or was it? Update! 05/5/2004--Bag of interesting Materials Found!--I have the bottom portion of Saros! I will rebuild this and profile it.
		I need to know when to throw things away--Paint from about 15 years ago or more, and they are still liquid!

Stories No One Believes

Story Number One: I had an Estes Semi-Scale Saturn 5, the small version with paper details. In only flew it once on a spring day when we lived in Colorado. The rocket was flown with the famous C6-5 engine. It went up, ejected its parachute, started to drift down, then stopped. Some sort of updraft and current got to it, although there was no breeze where we were. The rocket continued to go horizontal, I chased it for about a mile, and it NEVER descended. It just kept going towards the mountains, and out of site.

Story Number Two: 2nd flight of my Mini-Bomarc, which I still have. I pushed the launch button, a puff of smoke came out the engine and I saw the ignition clips drop. For a moment the rocket stayed there, then, suddenly, it started to smoke, and rise but in slow motion! Slowly it went up the launch rod, taking a few seconds, then went horizontal and popped the chute a few inches over the top of the rod, falling to the ground and breaking part of its vertical stabilizer. What kind of defect could have caused this?!

Wierd Engine Facts

1) Estes made a "Static Test Engine" in the late 1960s, and warned not to attempt to fly it. What was that about?

2) Estes made a "Short" engine. These were replaced by the Mini "T" class engines in the early 1970s. In fact, Estes had an adapter kit to adapt older models. The Short Engines had the same diameter of the standard A-C class engines.

This one I can prove, ready for some fun?

	The top left picture shows a A5-0S, booster engine, date coded 2-18-1972. This has never been fired. I used it for my Beta rocket.   Above see the comparison with a modern B6-2. Notice ts the same diameter, thicker casing.   Feast your eyes on this baby I pulled out of my archives. It's an UNOPENED package of A5-4S short engines.

Other Tidbits

This is my original field kit, from 1969/1970! When my dad ordered my Starter Kit, this came with the launcher, launch stand, paint, Alpha kit, and some other accessories. The packing box served as a Field Operations Kit. The Kit is now retired, and houses the vintage Short Engines and launcher. My dad found an ad in the back of Boy's Life, and ordered this kit in 1969. Soon after he ordered the Big Bertha, Beta, and got a free Mark. Wish I could remove that damn packing tape. Ideas anyone?

My original launcher, with key!

Bringing back the Gyroc

Estes' Gyroc is an interesting rocket, as its recovery system consisted of ejecting the spent engine, flipping its wing surfaces, and effecting a spinning helicopter recovery.

I built this Gyroc when I was about 12. I never finished it. Tape hinge material is used for joining fin surfaces, but these had dried out/broke off. Further, I had never installed the elastic cord mechanism to flip the wing surfaces. Read below my restoration.

	Here is the Gyroc after about 30 years of storage. Man, I feel old.
	This rocket was never flown, sported an orange and brown color combination, and had a cracked main fin that had been reglued. Fins were weak, but overall model was in good shape. I believe I had sprayed the body brown, then hand painted the fins orange.
	First, I test fitted the elevators that will function as the rotary devices. One side fit fair, the other, poor.
	So, very carefully, I started to sand. I used a high grit to flatten surfaces quickly and hold down the time and movement of the fins--saving stress. Here I use the edge of a sanding block so I can clear the vertical fins.
	Here I am creating a better flat surface.
	Here, rough glue edges and other mistakes are taken care of by wrapping a fine sandpaper around my X-Acto knife handle.
	Alignment of the fins was very good, especially for a 12 year old boy who made this...me! Notice the Andromeda in the background, broke in half. The Andromeda was the last rocket I made as a kid, and a bunch of books fell on it and broke it before I ever flew it. Its restoration activities coming soon.
	Because we sanded the connecting surfaces, the wood tabs that hold the elevators closed during flight, friction fit against the engine, were now going to hit the body. So I took about 1/32 off with my Dremel tool.
	Old, temporary black tape I had used to hold the fins on left 30 year old residue. This was removed with a blade, carefully.
	Here, I strengthened the fins by applying a number of glue "fillets". This really worked, fins are now super-strong.
	Excess glue from a long time ago is removed carefully with super fine sandpaper.
	The model was resprayed with Testors Orange. I did not want to completely abandon the original color scheme. This orange was very close. At Michaels, I found white elastic cord similar to what I remembered, and a large needle, and installed the elevator cords.
	Here it is, done!
Results: Flown on March 27th, 2004, my son fired the rocket into the air. FANTASTIC! It really rotates downward beautifully. I was expecting a kind of rotating flutter, but this thing spins on its axis, perfectly, and rotates down to a soft landing. 4 flights, one stuck in a tree that I got down with my trusty tree-beater. This really is a brilliant design. A total trip to finish something so many years later, and fly it with my son.

More Gyroc Fun!

From June 29, 2004

Continuing caution with the originality and vintage aspect of my Estes Gyroc, I have put it back into temporary retirement and started construction on my Super Gyroc.

This will be a 250% increase in size. Overall length and body tube diameter are only a few percentages off, so I consider this a semi scale. Balance points for both rockets are very similar. Nose cone shape is slightly different. New version looks much longer and out of scale, but in fact it is very, very close.

I have also designed a rudimentary, but much better functioning, elevator hold solution. The old Gyroc had the tabs and a friction fit against the engine. This worked fair at best. My system may be even more primitive, but should work better. Pictures of that to follow once I install the engine mount.

The engine mount will be self-pressurized. The BT-20 type holder will have an engine block only, and will be capped off with a balsa nose block.

I will post flight data upon completion, in about 2 weeks. For now, here are some pictures of its construction.

	Here it is under construction. One set of rudders on, elevators in place. Nose cone is plastic, and will NOT be glued on, but affixed with a shock cord. This is to allow weight to be added if necessary.
	Here is a close up of the elevator. Notice the hinges, used for R/C airplane wings. These are embedded into the balsa. I used 1/8" balsa which is the minimum I would try this with. So much better than the Estes "Tape Hinge Material" which cracked, dried, and released. Then the question, do you paint it, etc. These are a pain to get in and get aligned, but they should last. The change in grain you see here is an optical illusion...you are looking at the rudder too.
	Here are the super sized fin patterns. These were blown up 250% from the original plans. The fin alignment guide was left over from my son's Big Bertha Project, as both use a BT-60 body tube. Alignment of all the wing surfaces is challenging but fun!
	Here is the finished SuperGyroc, done up in Testors Yellow, next to my refurbished original Gyroc (elevators removed but still available and bird can still fly). Notice the overall size difference.
	Here is a front view.
	Notice that I have not sealed the cone to the body. This was so that I could replace the nose cone if damaged, and also to add weight if I needed to...which I ended up not having to worry about. I double ended the shock cord and used a standard mount. For the BT-20 engine tube, I simply used about a 8" piece and "coned" it off internally, so that I would only have to pressurize a small tube.

Other Interesting Documentation

Click on the picture to the right to get the full first page of the TR-1 Technical Report.
Click on the picture to the right to get the full 2nd page of the TR-1 Technical Report.
Click on the picture at right to get the unwittingly hilarious and dated suicide avoidance paper. They really tried to make rocket motors out of CO2 cartridges and match heads? Page One
Page Two

From the "What Were They Thinking Dept." (Circa 1972)

I should have smoothed that replacement propeller with a file, or at the very least, not let my finger get sliced by it.

This section outlines our adventures with COX products.

Cox was purchased by Estes in 1996. Cox was a California company that started in 1945 by Roy Cox. This company was located initially in Placentia, California, then Santa Ana, then Corona. These towns are all close to my home, so this makes it even more fun. Roy was a pioneer in affordable cars and planes powered by tiny internal combustion engines.

I would have been angry if Cox was purchased by someone else and taken out of CA, but as it was, it was bought up by Estes and moved to Penrose. Estes is one of my favorite companies, so I was excited to hear this.

There have always been rumors about Cox "going away", and I was concerned as the Estes web site stated Estex-Cox as the company, but had no Cox items on it. A call to Customer Service at Cox eliminated my fears. Cox is bringing out MORE items, more hobbiest-oriented, and has its own sales and marketing team from Estes. They operate distinctly, which I think is great! A complete history is here: http://www.coxmodels.com/Aboutus.asp

I grew up with Estes, but Cox I did not dabble in Cox until I picked up a Flying Saucer in the early 90s. I could not figure out how to get it to fly until one day I was playing with it and it just took off! It went out of site and I lost it for a week, then found it on the side of my condo development, soaked with sprinkler water and the styrofoam crumbling off. Believe it or not, I worked with it more and flew it tons, and still have it!

Next up I purchased a Sky Jumper helicopter, and promptly lost it, then another one. I cooled off on Cox until the past few years.

I purchased a Sky Jumper with my son, and we have flown it dozens of times. I have the following models also.

Cox made cars! The R/C gas cars were very basic, but I have gotten into the post-tether "free driving" cars. One of the most popular was the Sand Blaster. I have one that is being gone through, and I also have the similar but apparently quite rare "Sand Tracker".

	Our famous Sky Jumper, veteran of many flights. Next to it is an Air Rescue, which has never been flow. Behind them is Jasman's new mini-Vertibird type toy.
Here is Cox' old helicopter, the SkyCopter. This has an .020 engine instead of the the .049. This has never been flown, and came with instructions. Unfortunately, my two year old broke one rotor, I must find another.
	Cox still makes a whole series of stand alone engines to put into models. This one is an .010, one of the world's smallest internal combustion engines. This came with a grey and a black prop, and its mount also serves as a fuel tank. This is ready to bolt onto a plane.
I have started control line flying also. This is a sport onto itself which shall be profiled seperately. Here is the beautiful Slip Stream model.
Unopened Star Wars Rebel Snow Speeder

Take me back home