Sunday, April 20, 2014

MPC USS Enterprise Build, Part 1, Parts

I'd been curious about the Chinese made MPC licensed kits.
This one looks nothing like the Star Trek enterprise except for the parachute and logo.
I made a Ebay bid of $.99 and won it!
I feel like I only paid for shipping.



Opening the box I was surprised by the BT-60 size diameter of the body tubes.
The 18" parachute looks like the round body of the T.V Enterprise. The plastic is thick, maybe 2mm.
Stick on fin decor and a nose cone wrap that goes on right above the shoulder.
The plastic fins are very flexible and shouldn't crack.
Below the fins is the fin can and engine cap locking ring.
The tubes are convolutely wound. They look and feel like rolled thin sheet plastic! Not spiral wound but wrapped like you would roll a body tube on a card stock model. 
The nose cone is blow-molded, 7 7/8" long! Directly below the nose cone is the tube connector. 



The box copy describes it a a "two-tiered design". I think of two-tiered as a larger lower section and smaller upper section. Upper and lower section diameters are the same.
The parts illustration on the back of the box looks like the old MPC line drawings.


The diameter is 1.58 or 40mm. When the fins are slid on and the tubes joined with the plastic connector, the model is almost 28.75" tall!

The recommended engine is a C6-5 - the package says the model weighs 3.67 oz. Maybe it'll only get 260 feet as advertised!
Estes or Quest C6-5? I wouldn't use a Quest engine in this heavy model.
It'll be interesting and require a lot of plastic cutting - it'll be converted for D12 engines.

EDIT: I should have added - 
These models are not the old MPC designs from the 1970s.
These models are based on the Chinese made SKY brand model rockets but in a trademarked wrapper.
The MPC / Round 2 models use licensed images of the Warner Brothers cartoon characters, the rock band KISS and Star Trek.
They also have some "generic" designs: Red Giant, Lunar Shuttle and G.T.S. 1.
MPC / Round 2 have also brought back the old plastic MPC Vostok and Titan IIIC.
Go HERE to see some of them.

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