Nike Smoke Comparisons

I first saw the Centuri Nike Smoke in the 1971 Centuri Catalog.
At the time it was big, 23.65" tall.
The airframe was an ST-16 at 1.64" diameter.
I never built this version.













Estes recently released a BT-60 version of the Nike Smoke.
Its very close to the same diameter as the old Centuri model at 1.637"
In the catalog page the tube diameter is rounded off at 1.64".
The Estes kit is a little shorter than the Centuri Nike Smoke at 22.9"


In 1972 I did order the Enerjet Nike Smoke. It was the only Enerjet kit I built and launched.
The Enerjet version was based on the Centuri kit using the ST-16 tubing and nose cone.

The engine mount was heavier duty. The nose cone tip was cut off.
An ST-5 tube was set down the middle with a plastic nose cone glued in the low end. Slots were cut above the nose cone shoulder. One of the the molded hatches was opened. The nose cone was 2/3 full of talcum powder.

When launched, air was forced into the open tube and the talcum powder was blown out the open hatch.

While doing research on these three versions I wondered why the Enerjet Nike Smoke was 2" shorter than the new Estes kit. The scale couldn't have been off by that much! Then I remembered the shortened "smoking" nose cone on the Enerjet rocket.