Freedom 7 Build Part 16 Tower

I probably should have done this before the tower was glued onto the capsule, but I was stuck.

Dr. Zooch has you simply glue the aero-spike toothpick to the top of the LES Canister Module.

I wanted to inset it in the top rather than just do a surface gluing.

The toothpick did look a little thick. While the instructions say you can substitute 1/2" of the wire, I didn't have enough wire left. I cut the head off a pin and cleaned up the rough edge with some small files.

The center was marked and the drill hole was started with an awl. The pin vise drill was used to make a hole about 1/4" in. The pin was painted red and glued into the hole.

At yesterday's launch, I finally flew my Dr. Zooch Little Joe. When building, I had set a pin into the LES Canister Module at the top of that tower. A toothpick spike was drilled and set down on the pin. When it came down on a gravel road the spike was slightly bent, but still held in place on the inset pin. I simply bent the spike and pin back to a straight position - no replacement was needed.

Here I'm forming the clamp ring fairing on the palm of my left hand. I wanted to get it close to perfectly round before gluing in place.

The aero-spike and clamp ring fairing in place.