Cheap Mid-Power kits

I'm have been interested in model rocketry for a while, but they have all been small rockets. I am looking to step up to mid-power rockets like Level 1 certification, but all the kits are very expensive. I was wondering if anyone could suggest some cheap mid-power kits. thanks

tom

Reply to
tcpekin
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Design your own! Where's the glory in flying other peoples rockets, even if you did add a bit of glue yourself?

Halam

Reply to
Halam Rose

For a first timer, try an Aerotech Cheetah or a IQSY Tomahawk. They fly on 29mm F's and G's, and assemble with thick CA Superglue.

Other goodand even cheaper (and traditional) rocket kits are the LOC Little Nuke, Aura, or Onyx or a StarBurst (2 X 24mm cluster, use Estes E9's or AT 24mm E's) these LOC kits all assemble with 10 minute epoxy. . For a kit to fly on a Level 1 Certification flight try a LOC EZI. With a motor adapter (and some minor fiberglass reinforcement) you can use this kit to certify Level 1 and 2.

Let us know what you decide to go with. By the way what is the largest motor you have flown?

P snipped-for-privacy@ssccorp.com wrote:

Reply to
paul

My favorite is still the LOC Graduator, or if it's still around the very similar THOY Hornet.

Reply to
Bob Kaplow

My first mid power kit (built many years ago and lost on it's second flight (an F14-4 engine; it tilted into the wind and sailed out over a large lake) was an Aerotech Wart Hog. Since then, as a BAR (just got back into rocketry this year) I've flown a LOC Onyx. I built it with yellow glue rather than epoxy (except for the shock cord anchor...used 30 minute epoxy for that). So far it has flown beautifully on F20-4 Econojet engines and even survived a prang (ballistic flight with rocket plowing nose into the earth before ejection) when I flew it on an old F14-4J that didn't ignite properly (chuffed on the pad for a few seconds before liftoff). The only damage from the prang was a tiny chip in the nose cone paint.

If you do go with a LOC kit, be sure to weigh it prior to choosing your engine. LOC states the Onyx weighs 13 ounces, but mine came to 20, so I had to select my engines accordingly. (Wrasp or Rocksim are good tools for selecting the appropriate engine).

Good luck and keep us up to date with your progress! Craig

Reply to
Craig

" snipped-for-privacy@ssccorp.com" wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@e3g2000cwe.googlegroups.com:

You've heard several voices tell you what rocket they like. I'll take a slightly different tack. Go to a site that has lots of reviews, written by fliers, of the kits they've built and flown. Read the comparison articles on various styles of kits. Use the search function to dig out information about motor retainers, engine manufacturers, and pros and cons from all sorts of angles.

Essence Model Rocketry Reviews (EMRR)

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I won my first mid-power rocket as a contest prize from a DesignContest (descon) administered by the webmaster of EMRR. The AeroTech Initiator that Nick personally handed to me provided a vehicle for my first AP engine flights. That was three summers ago. It's flown 10 times so far. Now I'm designing my own mid and high power rockets, and constructing them out of surplus materials. I certified for L1 HPR this summer on my tube-finned crayon.

Look me up on EMRR to see my reviews. Search on 'turnbull'.

ScottE

Reply to
ScottE

"ScottE" wrote

Soctts right to point you towards many of the points to consider about a rocket kit, but here is one principal that I recognized when deciding which way to go on my level 1.

Cheaper rockets use less materials. Less materials mean smaller less draggy airframes which weigh less. This means you get a lot more performance - speed and height. At the same time smaller airfames are harder to track and loose. For your level 1 to be cheep you must not loose the rocket! If you lose the rocket you fail level 1, you waste the cost of the kit, the reload and the motor case. Its cheeper to spend the money on a bigger kit. But kept he weight down because weight requires stronger and more costly shock cord, bigger parachute etc.

I did lost of sims while designing my level 1 rocket and round that the best way available to limit performance was to use tube fins which I surrounded by a ring. This gave be a 3lb rocket flying to 850 - 1000 feet.

Depending on your temperament alternative advice is to fly the rocket you want and hang the cost.

Halam

Reply to
Halam Rose

"Halam Rose" wrote in news:2WE_g.8891$ snipped-for-privacy@newsfe1-gui.ntli.net:

I'll 2nd most of those observations. When first considering the road to L1, I picked up a PML IO kit. Not too expensive. Not too large. I chose the 38mm motor mount option to give me a lot of potential thrust. It included the recovery harness and parachute as part of the kit.

Well, after building it, and flying it at NERRF on a G69, I realized that it needed way more field than I could regularly get to. It hopped up about

2400 feet on the G, nearly lost to my eyesight. I was seriously concerned about keeping my eye on it if I were to double its altitude with an H.

So, I went with the tube finned crayon plan to limit the altitude, and make the rocket big enough to easily track and recover.

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It's built like a tank, with way more motor mount strength than is needed for an H. I've flown it on an "I". The chute hung up in the chute protector and it tumbled down for a bounce recovery. One resulting minor spiral crease lead me to double the airframe for several inches above the motor mount.It should easily handle a J as an L2 vehicle.

One quibble point I'll make is that cheaper doesn't necessarily mean lighter. If you wander off the typical list of materials used for kits, then you may find that cheaper means heavier, and therefore lower flying. The tube finned crayon is nearly 6 pounds.

My $20 V2 inspired Crayon V2 is nearly 2 pounds without a motor, and needs a G to get any serious altitude. That makes it a great mid powered rocket for our relatively small club field.

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That's great if you're looking for ways to spend lots of money lofting heavy rockets to modest heights. I have other rockets that will out climb my crayon based birds at much lower launch costs.

Bigger isn't necessarily better....but it is louder!

ScottE

Reply to
ScottE

before you look into kits, make sure you have a launch field big enough.

2 years ago at NARCON one vendor was selling shopworn kits for $20 a pop, kits were in the $60-$100 range retail, so our whole club just about paid itself off savingswise for that trip.

you want really cheap? scrounge. plenty of people have websites up of how they made a HPR rocket from next to nothing (fedex shipping box). biggest problem seems to be nosecones.

Reply to
Tater

Snip

Nice one Scott, I used a lot less hardware in a similar rocket with only 2

6mm centering rings so had a lot less weight so I could use nylon cord for the recovery and a 30" parachute all keeping cost down. One disadvantage I found with a glued up tube tail was some delamination of the fins adjacent to the glue line - still flyable but would not take repeated bashings. Your bolted through construction would help with this problem, so would a larger chute.

Simulations taught me that for a rocket like this has its performance dictated much more by drag than mass.

Anyone contemplating level 1 would benefit from recognizing it is a very specific mission to design a rocket for - its needs to be simple and safe and all the action is best kept close to the pad. On the other hand if you want to fly a min diameter multiple recovery clustered stager replica record breaker then go for it - you only do your first level 1 flight once.

BW

Halam

Reply to
Halam Rose

BTW, I prefer launch rod to rail for tube fin rockets but that's a weight thing as well.

H
Reply to
Halam Rose

"Tater" wrote

See a discussion on this newsgroup a few weeks ago about nose cones costing pennies.

H
Reply to
Halam Rose

I am building the Big Daddy w/ E9-6

Reply to
tcpekin

Heavier doesn't necessarily mean lower flying. A rocket that is less than optimal mass will go lower than a heavier rocket that is at optimal mass.

The optimal mass will vary from rocket to rocket, and motor to motor. If you are trying to maximize altitude, run some sims using the parameters of the rocket you are going to fly, with the motor you are going to fly. Vary the mass of the rocket by one ounce at a time and see what the predicted altitude is. At some point the predicted altitude will no stop going up and begin to go down. That'll be close to the optimal mass for that rocket/motor combination.

A foam ball is lighter than a brick...which one can you throw further? The majority of your altitude gain will typically happen after the motor burns out, while it's coasting. If the rocket is too light it will not have the mass needed to overcome all the other forces (gravity, drag) and attain the highest possible altitude.

Reply to
Anonymous

nojunk@this_address.com (Mike Pearson ) wrote in news:1hnmczo.1wimxbewejy68N%nojunk@this_address.com:

Yes, there's that, and I was oversimplifying with my initial statement about heavier meaning lower. I think RockSim even has a button to figure out the optimum weight for a given airframe.

"Optimum mass prediction: Malewicki plots showing altitude vs. mass."

It's all about the big P, momentum, and how quickly drag and the effectively constant tug of gravity will bleed off any momentum gained during boost. Some designs exhibit much more sensitivity to such things than others. A very light, or very draggy design will tend to put the brakes on once the engine cuts out. The gravitational force is the constant in the experiements.

I just flew a rocket that was an excellent example of "too light" to fly high. It's not quite public yet, as it's part of EMRR's current Spacecraft Design Contest. It was only by adding some appreciable nose weight that the rocket's true altitude potential could be realized. A clear case of more weight giving more altitude, due to the unusualy large cross section and light weight of the intial design.

While a heavier rocket may coast higher, it will undoubtably want to fall faster. Add weight to toss it higher, and shoulder the burden of returning that much more weight from that higher altitude.

Depending upon the flier's desires, just enough weight in just the right place for stable flight can keep your recovery system smaller (and cheaper) for the same target descent rate.

The fact that this is, in fact, Rocket Science, is what makes this a hobby that can keep you busy for a loooong time.

ScottE

Reply to
ScottE

While Yank is no longer really in business, LOC is still making them and can still have them made in Phlexible Phenolic.. Binder Design

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also makes some larger low cost lvl 1 capable rockets.. I went a bit extreme with my level 1 rocket because I wanted to go level 1 as well as level 2 at the same time.. I did the Yank 4" x 109" Black Brant X and did my level 1 on an I285 and level 2 on a J350.. I had looked into the Binder Design kits a few times in the past and they seem like really well built models.. Just remember to request the phlexible phenolic if you're going to go with Yank.. LOC doesn't generally build their models out of the phlexible stuff unless you ask them to..

Reply to
cgiucf

Sorry to sound pessimistic, but if you think the L1 rockets are expensive, wait until you start feeding them. I had four launches for about $130, plus the motor hardware cases. L1 size rockets are relatively capital expenditure light and operating expenditure intensive.

Good luck.

Reply to
Thomas Koszuta

It gets very expensive for motors as you go up the line in certification levels.

This past weekend, I launched 3 rockets, one of which was a level 2 type rocket. $115 in propellant alone for that one rocket. (plus igniters, e-matches, BP)

Its kind of like a child. Its expensive to have a child (hospital bills and all) but try to think of the food bill for the next 18 years.

-Aar> Sorry to sound pessimistic, but if you think the L1 rockets are expensive,

Reply to
Aaron

Wait just a minute here.. I'm suposed to be feeding my kids??? Dammt.. someone should have told me that..

Reply to
cgiucf

My kids never let me forget. Every other day it's "whaa whaa whaa, we want food!"

Reply to
Mal Content

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