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Sunday, July 31, 2011

Dressing Up Launch Lugs

Here's the 1/4" diameter launch lugs on the Apogee Saturn V kit.
This 3" long lug was cut in two for two 1 1/2" lugs.
Standoffs are already glued on both pieces.
Even though these are larger 1/4" diameter lugs, you can also finish up 1/8" and 3/16" lugs as shown here.

I usually will sand the ends of the assembly so the end of the lug and standoff are square. This will leave paper rolled over the inside and outside of the lug end.
This could leave your rocket hung you up on the rod at launch.
To remove this (rolled under paper lip), I use a sharpened dowel to lightly lift out the rolled paper above the edge of the lug end. Now it can be sanded off with 400 grit sandpaper on a block.




After it is sanded off, another wider dowel is used to clean up and re-round the lug opening.








Be sure to lightly sand the outside edge to remove any of the outside Mylar that might be rolled down on the outside of the lug wall.

1 comment:

  1. Nice post, I'd never seen this mentioned in tips sections. I don't do enough of this, but when I do I use tapered punches in lieu of dowels.

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