Dr. Zooch Saturn V F1 Engines Step 10 Part 2

That upper engine bell piece has a very small closed end.
I ended up using a toothpick to pre-form the shroud.

I didn't bring a tapered dowel with me on this cruise so I ended up using whatever was handy.
This tapered Holland America pen was perfect for forming the lower end of the nozzle bells.

After setting glue on the shroud tab (remember, it takes very little glue to adhere a paper shroud) the tab line was lined up.
The tab was held with the end of a long smooth jawed tweezers.

Notice the printed lines are on the inside. I don't want to take the chance of the printer ink bleeding through the paint later on.
Keeping the printed lines and words on the inside may not work for every build, it's harder to do this on larger shrouds.

After the lower shrouds were glued up and dried, they were made round again by rolling them over the heel of my hand.

After gluing and clamping they'll be oval shaped and should be made round before gluing on the upper half.

Dr. Zooch Saturn V F1 Engines Step 10 Part 1

Those small center curves are easier to cut with a large barrel on the rotary punch.
I'm never able to cut anything that round and small with the tip of an X-Acto.

Here's the other tools needed to cut and form the two piece nozzle bells.

The long tweezers is for holding down the glued tab.
The blue en will be used to preform the shrouds on the soft heel of my hand.

Make all your straight cuts with a knife and straight edge.

Make all the curved cuts with sharp scissors.
TIP: You can sharpen scissors by cutting through 400 grit sandpaper.

Dr. Zooch Saturn V Fins Step 9 Part 4

Lastly, cut the trailing edge using the extended lines.









All four fins are ready for grain filling. Sanding the filler correctly will sharpen the taper line more before spraying on a primer.

Future Products Page from Estes

Cruzsergio on TRF found the Future Products page on the Estes website:
http://www.estesrockets.com/rockets/in-development

1103 Planet Purple™
1104 Outer-Space Orange™
1954 Red Flare™
1955 Top Shot™
2158 AGM-57X Heatseeker™
2438 Sky Shark™
2442 Mini Fat Boy™
7223 Rogue Voyager™
7224 Astron Sprint XL™

The Planet Purple and Outer Space Orange sound like variations on the new Crayon Series.
The AGM-57X Heatseeker is probably a re-issue of the E2X series model.
I've seen a picture of the upscale Astron Sprint XL somewhere online.
The Mini Fat Boy should be a favorite.

This web page looks to be a teaser, no pictures or other informationis available.

Dr. Zooch Saturn V Fins Step 9 Part 3

Don’t remove the tape yet!

The picture shows an example of how the edge should look before removing the tape. Just a little thin line of black remains. When you sand off the remaining blackened edge, the taper is squared off, like a dull knife. 



For a little more strength, some medium CA was set down on just the leading edge using a Q-Tip. The instructions say to cover all the fin surfaces with CA for strength. Don’t let any CA get near the root edge of the fins. When gluing the fins to the fairings, white glue won’t soak into the balsa if it is saturated and sealed with CA.

After the CA glue dries, sand smooth with 400 grit.

Slowly remove the clear tape being careful not to pull up any balsa. This clear tape is more tacky than a masking tape.
If you had removed some of tackiness earlier, you won’t have any problem removing the tape.
 

Set the tapered balsa fin strip over the extended lines of the fin pattern. Use those lines to score and cut out the root and outside edges of the fins.

As mentioned before, I started this build before I had a new kit, using some older kit instructions for a fin pattern. The instruction illustration is slightly larger than the fin pattern supplied in the kit. 

Tools! Part 3

I use these so often now, I don't know how I got by without them before.

Q-Tips (or cotton swabs) are great for picking up excess glue.
At the top of a fin, where the leading edge meets the body tube, there is always a little white glue "roll-over". You won't see it until the primer goes on.
Use a Q-Tip over that spot and pick up the glue before it dries.
These also work to smooth fillets in areas that are smaller than your fingertip can reach.

The only drag - you can only use them once. Use it and toss it!
(You don't want to go over a new area with half dried glue on the tip.)

The rotary punch can make engine hook (movement allowance) slots in centering rings.
Sure, the "slots" are rounded, but the cuts are cleaner than you could make with a knife.
I also use the punch to make the rounded end of a launch lug slot in a tail cone.
Again, the round punched end will be cleaner than any small circle you could cut with a knife.

Turn the rotary head to the smallest barrel to make holes for tying a shroud line on a parachute. (You do have to make the punch with a card stock backing. The thin, flexible parachute won't punch clean unless it has a stiff backing board.)

A standard single index punch makes a clean hole in a body tube.
This is probably what Estes used on the early Scout models for an ejection charge port.

Try it - you'll be surprised how clean the punched hole is.

Finally, one of the most used tools on my bench, long tweezers.

Next time you are tying on shroud lines to a parachute, try using a long tweezers.
You'll get the job done in half the time.

Long tweezers are handy for fishing out a Kevlar line from the motor mount through the front end of a body tube.

Dr. Zooch Saturn V Fins Step 9 Part 2

I went "old school" on this one, using a tape border to help sand the taper sharp and straight.

TIP: Instead of using masking tape, you can use a strip of clear packing tape. You can sand through masking tape, you won’t sand through the edge of the thicker clear packing tape.

Before sticking the tape down on the taper line, diminish the stickiness of the tape by pressing the tacky side down on your pant leg a few times. If you used the tape right off the roll, it could pull up and remove some balsa.

You’ll be able to check the thickness and straightness of the taper if you LIGHTLY mark the leading edge with a quick swipe of a permanent marker.

Don’t make this too black, you don’t want it soaking into the balsa. If the leading edge is left with a dark ink line after sanding, paint coats may not cover it up!

Sometimes an older marker (that is starting to dry up) works better.

The idea is to lightly blacken the leading edge so you can easier see how much is being sanded down. With the edge blackened you can see how straight the "knife edge" line is.
 

400 grit sandpaper on a block was used to sand the taper.
 
Sight down the (soon to be) leading edge to check the thickness of the taper for consistency. You could take it down to a knife edge, but I like to leave it with a little squareness at the top for strength.