Rocket building tips

The "usual Testors tube cement"...is in no way "usual". The one group of people who probably avoid it more than any other group...is serious plastic modelers...lol. Most serious plastic scale modelers find it useless.

Testors LIQUID Cement is about the best thing ever invented. Bonds/welds excellently, with plenty of working time....and with none of the harsh nastiness of MEK-ish substances.

Testor's liquid cement is almost pure toluene. It's not much more expensive than gasoline in drum lots :-)

For elastic, I just buy it at Wal-Mart, $.99 for 3 yards.

Pratt Hobbies sells Kevlar although I haven't seen a reason to use it. I just replace the elastic as needed in smaller rockets. I use tubular nylon in large rockets over 3 lb.

Tom

about 95% of the posts here, you'll be just fine.

As Jerry is wont to say, "This should be in the FAQ" ;-)

scouring the web I haven't come up with a good place to purchase bulk shock cord material that I can measure and cut for longer shock cords.

You can get elastic alot of places other than Wally World for about the same price, such as Pat Catans, Micheals, etc. Anywhere there's a fabric/sewing section in the store. Which is good since I prefer not shop in a place that's a union breaking chinese factory outlet with a

kevlar cords should I use and what is a good vender to purchase them from? I'd like to try the Quest style of shock cords out.

Since Great Lakes Hoobies is local I tend to buy a fair amount of toys there, that includes Kevlar. They do mail order. But as long as you're doing just model rockets I'd not bother with Kevlar unless the kit comes with it, elastic will serve you just fine. If and when you go to larger toys and maybe high power then you'll need to start considering Kevlar. At that time 20 feet would be a bare minimum length as the stuff isn't elastic and the shock as it snaps tight could cause a zipper (cuts in the body tube as the cord slices through) or possibly tearing loose the shockcord anchor. 100+ feet cords aren't uncommon.

Chuck

Of course, I was not suggesting that one consume it internally...nor in an internal combustion engine.

:o)

But, I have found that it works *very* well for gluing styrene "fin can" units to cardboard body tubes (a la many Quest kits). Just "slop" a hefty amount of the Testors Liquid to the gluing surface of the plastic fin unit. Let it sit for a minute. Repeat, so that it becomes "tacky". Spread some yellow carpenter's glue to the inner gluing surface of the tube... and attach the two parts. In theory, there is no reason why it should work...but it does.

:o)

I normally do 3x to 3.5x the length, maybe more for heavier nosecones.

Eldred