Amateur Rocketry

I always did the Estes thing as a kid with my Dad, launching from the parking lot of the local community college. Some came back, many didn't, but it was a ton of fun. One of my first summer jobs was as a teaching assistant at the (then) Museum of Science and Industry, helping to teach a model rocketry class. We'd spend the summer building rockets then launch them in the parking lot of USC's Coliseum. Many ended up drifting into the stadium, presumably to be found by custodial staff or perhaps even a fan once the season started. Great memories!

The things amateurs are doing these days blows my mind. Really cool stuff.
 
I built one and I guess I didn't get enough glue around the top of the metal spring that holds the engine.....first flight fire shoots out bottom, nose cone pops off and the engine shoots out of the top somewhere....some head scratching till one of the group shouted "fire", 10 minutes of trying to stomp it out and then we decided time to call the fire department.....this was before cell phones so one of us kids had to run to the nearest house to call the FD. Well this 13 y.o. was concerned but this was all done under "adult" supervision. Good times. I think we burned about 10 acres.
 
Dana said:
I don't know anybody who successfully launched a Gyroc ("successfully" meaning the wings not ripping off).

Later on we got tired of making fancy rockets just to lose them so we just hot glued fins directly to the engine.
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I agree that there was a Centuri version also. As I had one, and all mine were Centuri.

And it flew fine.
 
I switched most of mine from parachutes to streamers. They come down closer.
 
I found it. Buried in the basement, the only rocket I have left. Probably >45 years old now. It’s about 3’ tall and, at the time, probably cost $1.50 in olive drab spray paint.

The Estes Honest John.

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Edit: and the real thing

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MATHEW POSTED
The Estes Honest John.




Edit: and the real thing



I "Played with the real thing", SETAF, Southern European Task Force. First Missile Command, NE Italy.

2 Wac Corporals battalions, 2 Honest John battalions.

Allegedly, we had atomic warheads. 1957, 1958.
 
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Honest John! I remember that one. Always wanted one. That was back when the idea of a tactical nuclear missile seemed pretty cool… I’m so happy most of us grew out of that. Wish we all had.

I got to help out my son and oldest granddaughter when they were going to launch her first and, I believe, only rocket. It’s so difficult to find a suitable place to launch now. By the time we got that bloody thing in the air I was pretty sure neighbors were going to call the cops. They may have, I don’t know… we launched, recovered, and got the hell out.
 
I just got my six year old son his first couple of Estes. I remember launching them as a kid, mostly unsuccessfully, but we built two of them together (glue and knives and spray paint what fun!) and took them out this last weekend to launch them. The Patriot and Big Bertha, both models I remember from my own childhood. It was awesome! So much fun. The kids loved it and I was honestly really impressed. Did a bunch of launches, like probably six or eight, until we blew the nose cone off of the Patriot - it returning to earth as a paper-towel roll lawn dart - and Big Bertha found it’s final resting pace in the top of a 60’ elm. Amazing fun, I was really surprised, and now my kids are talking about more rockets from Santa… and to be honest, Santa will be happy to oblige.
 
Big Bertha was a Centuri design. :)

I had one.

Wildest one I launched was a scale V2. You had the choice of scale sized fins or oversized. I went with scale size. It went vertical for about 15 feet, then turned 90 degrees and flew parallel the ground.

We had a LARGE open field near my house at the time to launch them.
 
Pinecone said:
Big Bertha was a Centuri design. :)

I had one.

Wildest one I launched was a scale V2. You had the choice of scale sized fins or oversized. I went with scale size. It went vertical for about 15 feet, then turned 90 degrees and flew parallel the ground.
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No, Big Bertha was a classic Estes rocket. Centuri had a near-clone. Later on, so did Quest, who almost cloned the name as well. Theirs was the Big Betty.

Yes, the V2 model rockets were quite unstable with scale fins...needed a lot of nose weight, and a fast-boost engine to get them stabilized before they could go horizontal. The smaller of the V2s in the pic I attached to post 4 above, a mid-power model, did that when I used a slow-boost 'E' or 'F' engine in it...an Aerotech Blackjack, I believe. It hit the ground just as the ejection charge fired, and required a lot of rebuilding.
 
Hmm. I don't remember ever buying Estes. But I know I had a Big Bertha.

I had some very cool science teachers and got to fly model airplane and launch model rockets in school. :D
 
I had a [Estes] Big Bertha. The day I first tried to launch it, the only engine I had around was a 1/2A6-2 (a tiny engine). It flew as high as the garage roof when the propellant ended, nosed over, and hit the driveway nose first, driving the nose cone into the body tube... and the ejection charge blew the motor mount tube out the back of the rocket.
 
Dana said:
I had a [Estes] Big Bertha. The day I first tried to launch it, the only engine I had around was a 1/2A6-2 (a tiny engine). It flew as high as the garage roof when the propellant ended, nosed over, and hit the driveway nose first, driving the nose cone into the body tube... and the ejection charge blew the motor mount tube out the back of the rocket.
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Those rockets had all sorts of adventures, and many of them pretty funny.

I remember a buddy and I built our own design. 3 D engines, it was really big. We launched it, it went up, WAY up, the engines stopped, it coasted over, and never popped open. It whistled on the way down, like a movie sound effect when a bomb is dropped, and was headed straight down towards a parking lot. There was only one car, my buddy's dad's, and there was a small berm between us and the car. The whistling simply stopped as the rocket disappeared behind the berm. Neither of us wanted to look, I can't remember where his dad was so I don't know if he was even aware of what happened. We slowly walked over, expecting to see a hole in the car, but the rocket had landed 6-10 feet away. It was only as long as the nosecone and the tail. The whole body tube was pretty well accordioned into nothing. The first and last launch of that one.
 
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