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Sunday, October 31, 2010

Estes Shock Cord Mounts TIP

I'm not a big fan of the Estes "Tea Bag" shock cord mounts. I never had any pull out at ejection, they just tend to be too bulky in a smaller diameter tube. Years ago, Estes would pre-print the shock cord angle (shown below) on the card stock mount. They dropped this "angled" method and now leave it up to the builder to decide.

With the elastic or rubber band folded twice over itself, it can block a parachute or streamer at ejection.
Here's that old solution to help keep the mount flat against the inside of the body tube.

Glue the elastic at an angle as shown. Look close at the picture and you can see the cardstock mount has already been pre-creased.






Here's the first fold. Note the loose end of the shock cord is laying beside the glued end.





At the second final fold, you can see how the elastic lays beside itself in a "Z" shape.

Before gluing into a tube, I'll form it into a crescent shape to better conform to the inside of the body tube.
TIP: Many modelers use too much glue when making a tri-fold mount or shroud. More glue only makes a mess and takes too long to dry. Use more glue to glue a tri-fold mount inside the body tube.

2 comments:

  1. Really excellent advice! I wish I'd have known this when I assembled the Estes mount in my Crossbow SST. Packing a chute into that thing is a huge pain due to the minimum-diameter design and the longer shock-cord I added. Thanks!

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  2. Great advice from someone who started flying Estes rockets back in 1971. I agree this method of angling the shock cord lowers the profile of the overall mount, as I experienced in an Estes Skyhook bought off eBay recently that needed a shock cord R&R. Thanks!

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