Lee Piester Talk at Museum Of Flight

Rick Piester posted this link on Facebook:
"Here's my dad telling the story of Centuri Engineering at the Seattle Museum of Flight."

If you haven't seen it, highly recommended - CLICK HERE

May 7, 2016 - Lee Piester, founder and President of Centuri Engineering, shares a nostalgic retrospective of the golden age of model rocketry and the early days of the space race. With an introduction by fellow rocketry pioneer Bill Stine.

Semroc (Estes) Starship Excalibur Build, Part 20, Crew Module Gluing

The underside of the crew module is wide. After drawing the placement lines most all the primer/filler was scraped off with a knife.

The back end of the crew module is glued 1/4" from the rear of the main airframe.

Mentioned earlier, the fit against the body tube seemed tighter right after shaping. These gaps will be filled and fillets applied.

Semroc (Estes) Starship Excalibur Build, Part 19, Gluing On The Reactor Bays

I tried to lay the glue bead towards the inside edge of the BT-5 reactor bay tubes so when they were pressed onto the main tube there would be an inside fillet.

The initial curvature fitting looked better before. The edges will require some filling with CWF and Titebond M&&TG.

After shaping my crew module ended up a bit narrower than the placement lines already drawn on the tube.

To guarantee it was centered I marked a piece of paper and checked the spacing on both sides. I marked a centerline on the tube and on the crew module ends.

F-16 Prototype Tweeks

Originally I was going to call this the F-17. It is based on the OOP F-16 Centuri Fighter Fleet model. I went back to the F-16 name after seeing some online F-17 fighter images. Where it is at now, it is closer to the F-16 design, as close as you can get to a model rocket styled jet. It's not a scale F-16 or even meant to be close.

Final kit designs never happen with a single prototype.
You can do ten different drawings, tweaking this and that, then start the first build.
The first attempt doesn't look quite like the drawing. You wish some angles were different, decal placement could be better.

On the left is the first prototype build. On the right notice the slight changes.
Some are obvious. Instead of being square, a trailing edge wing taper was added. The Stars and Bars was changed back to the original, correct five point star after I found out I could use it without paying to use it. U.S.A.F. stayed as the U.S.F.F. The "missile" wing lugs were cut at an angle.

The air intake was made larger without the long taper to the back end. This was changed for easier construction. The new cut easily slips and "locks"over the main BT-50H body tube against the wing root edges. It spreads out a bit and ended up more of an oval shape. 

I wanted this model to have a lot going on visually. Pieces overhang and under hang.
The nose cone will probably be plastic, longer and closer to the size used in the Centuri kit.

Now if I could just get the right thickness of clear plastic for the vacu-form canopies!

Mega Zoom Broom?

Here's one from a company I never knew existed.
From Rocketpad - It's the MEGA ZOOM BROOM! 
This kit is up for auction on Ebay.

I don't understand this design. It's a sorta' upscaled, stretch version of the Estes Goonybird Zoom Broom. The original Goonys were introduced in 1973.
Apparently Rocketpad had quite a few kits out from 2004 through 2006. Many were MEGA versions of older Estes designs. CLICK HERE to see the lineup.

This Rocketpad kit may have upscale fins and the nose cone profile but there are no markings that even hint at the Estes original. The fins make no sense without the "airplane" decor.
Maybe that's why it needs the big "MEGA ZOOM BROOM" name down the side so you'll know what it's supposed to be.

Semroc (Estes) Starship Excalibur Build, Part 18, New Decal Name Font

On YORF, Jeffy Jeep mentioned he didn't care for the Starship Excalibur name font used on the Semroc decal sheet. I had to agree!

You have to realize this model was designed back in 1968! An amazing design for that time. In 1968, font choices were few. New fonts were expensive and print shops used what they had on hand.

I wondered why Carl at Semroc picked this font for the kit. Look at the upper right of the Estes plan shown above - there it is! Carl was just following the Estes example.

The original font looks to be set in Dom Casual Extra Bold, a goofy looking font for a Starship. I looked through some type styles that were already on my laptop.

#1 is a good choice. Bold, contemporary and easy to read.
#2 is the same font used on the Star Trek Enterprise.
#3 is too modern and doesn't reflect the year this model was designed. The "S" is a little like Star Trek logo.
#4 reminds me of Battlestar Galactica or Intellivison.
#5 just doesn't work - too bold and too recent.

Type fonts should reflect the design and the time period of the subject.
I'll want to pick a font that was from around 1968 but maybe not available for sale then.
I'll probably go with #1 or #2,
What do you guys think?

Semroc (Estes) Starship Excalibur Build, Part 17, Rear Shroud Fit and Gluing

It takes very little glue to join a shroud tab. Smear the glue evenly over the glue tab so none can be squeezed out when the tab is pressed in place.

I set the shroud over a wide dowel and burnish the tab are with a sharpie barrel. It's only necessary to burnish towards the overlap line. If you go too far to the right you'll emboss the card stock tab underneath.

The inset picture shows the first dry fit of the shroud. Earlier the engine mount was glued in so the rear ring was recessed by 1/16". I wish it were set in a little more, the fit of the shroud end could have been even with the tube end.

The shroud was removed and a very thin bit of the edge was trimmed off to make the shroud fit deeper.

The shroud was glued in place. I used my sanding block to evenly press it into place.




While the glue was still wet, any uneven surfaces were smoothed with the back end of a Sharpie.

The inset picture shows the fitted shroud, ready for a glue fillet of Titebond M&TG.