Hobby Lobby Finally Comes To Castle Rock, Colorado

For the past several months, my morning and afternoon commutes to and from work have taken me past a building under construction only a mile and a half from my home. 
A sign next to the building touted: "Coming Soon - Hobby Lobby".
Everyday, as I drove past, I glanced over to see how construction was progressing, greatly anticipating finally having a small source of model rocketry supplies in my neck of the woods.
The store finally opened a couple of weeks ago, and I paid my first visit this past Saturday.
Hanging on the rocketry wall was the usual fare of Estes product carried by all Hobby Lobby stores.
I am elated that I have this so close to home now.  Previously, I had to travel to Lone Tree (South Denver), a 20 mile drive from Castle Rock, to get to the nearest Hobby Lobby.
Time to start printing out them 40% off coupons......

MPC Lunar Patrol, Part 19 - A Near Disaster!

In the two years since I became a BAR, every single rocket that has been added to the BlastFromThePast fleet has had some kind of small imperfection or problem.  I try to be as careful as I can during building and finishing, yet I always find that one small paint blemish, or one spot of balsa grain that didn't get quite filled, or a slightly mis-aligned decal, or some other issue. Although it doesn't distract significantly from the overall model, it's still there.
And it irks me!
This weekend, I made a huge error that almost caused me to have to trash one of the Lunar Patrol gliders.
And it occurred on the very last build/finish operation.
Last Friday evening, I mounted each of the gliders on a building spike consisting of motor casings glued to a piece of cardboard.  This was so I could apply a light coat of Future to the glider top-sides to seal the decals.
Saturday afternoon I went to remove the gliders from the spikes.  One slid off easily...the other one was stuck fast to the motor casing.  Apparently, some of the Future had seeped in between the body tube and casing, virtually gluing the two pieces together.
No problem, I thought...I can just twist it off.   No deal.  It wouldn't budge. 
And in the process of trying, the upper motor casing broke off from the rest of the spike.
To my chagrin, only 1/16th inch of the casing remained protruding from the glider. Not enough to grab on to with any type of pliers.
Now what?  I found a length of dowel and tried pushing the casing out from the other end.   Fail!  That thing was stuck fast.
Next I tried drilling out the ceramic nozzle large enough to fit a sturdy hook inside the casing and attempt to pull it out.
That didn't fly, either.
I realized that any further attempts to remove the casing using any of these methods would likely result in breaking wings and fins off the glider, severely damaging the body tube, or both.
I put the model down on the bench and walked away, resolving to brainstorm another way to solve this sticky problem.
That night, while in bed around 2 a.m., I popped wide awake and thought about that glider. I envisioned a solution that just might work!
The next morning, I hustled down to the basement shop, found a short piece of scrap BT-20 tube, one of my painting wands consisting of a motor casing glued to the end of a dowel, and one of my woodworking mallets.
Before attempting the operation I had planned, I ran an X-acto knife blade around the joint between the glider tube and stuck motor casing to break the surface seal.
I placed the body tube section over the tiny bit of exposed motor casing and butted it up against the glider tube. 
Standing the assembly vertically on the work bench, I slid the painting wand down the front of the glider tube until it contacted the stuck motor casing inside.
One sharp rap with the mallet on the end of the painting wand dowel was enough to break the motor casing free!
Phew!  Now I didn't have to trash anything and set back the Lunar Patrol completion date based on the time it would take to build and finish a new glider.
As for damage control, there were only some very tiny dings at the very end of the glider tube.  A little sanding and paint touch up was all that was required to make things good again.

Here is a pic of the glider, the kit of 'extraction' tools, and the offending motor casing.

A little bit of Yankee Ingenuity to correct a stupid Yankee Mistake!

Phew! Back In Business In Castle Rock!

I just received an e-mail from the Fire Prevention Officer at Castle Rock Fire & Rescue.
After researching the Municipal Ordinances and Regulations, he found that model rockets are permissible if there are no Stage 1 or 2 Fire Restrictions in effect.
Yippee!!

Drat!...Lost My Castle Rock Launch Site

I just learned that the Town of Castle Rock, Colorado had recently re-drafted their Municipal Ordinance.  One of the changes specifically prohibits the launch of model rockets within city limits.
This means I lost the use of that really nice B-engine field adjacent to the high school, that is a mere half-mile from my house.
Bummer!
Oh, well, I can at least still use the field to hand launch all of my gliders for glide trimming....

An amendment to this post... Maybe all is not lost. I contacted the Castle Rock fire department, and received an email which spells out model rockets not being permissible during stage 1 or higher fire danger, which the area is under right now. I sent an email response asking if rockets are permissible at times there are no restrictions in place.  Still awaiting a reply.

MPC Lunar Patrol, Part 18 - The Final Decals

This morning, I was up at 4 a.m. merrily affixing the final decal to one of the gliders.  This is a remake of the same decal I hopelessly muffed up on a week ago, and had to discard.  This time things went very smoothly.

I also managed to apply some CA to the end of the booster tube, and get the shock cord and mount glued in place.
All that remains on this build is to apply some sealant over the decals, shoot a finish coat of black paint on the glider noses, take the gliders out to a nearby field for hand-toss glide trimming, and glue the noses in place. 
It's been  a long drawn out build, but I greatly anticipate seeing this model finally take to the air under rocket power!

A Rocket Room Upgrade

This past weekend was spent mostly in a large-scale furniture re-arranging project around the BlastFromThePast home. 
OOooh...my back! 
In the process, I acquired a whole new work desk and shelf unit for the model rocket corner of the basement. 

This is an old computer desk with plenty of closed lower cabinet storage, and a slide out  work surface.
Finally, I could get rid of that hoary, nasty old bench that was cobbled together out of scrap wood.
No progress on rocket builds was accomplished this weekend, but at least I now have a much nicer shop to work in.
Cheers!

MPC Lunar Patrol, Part 17 - Glider Decals

Last night, I spent the evening applying decals to the Lunar Patrol gliders.  The decals are all home-print, consisting of left-overs from the MPC sheet as well as a few custom number and stripe details.
I didn't get the 'LPC-B' designation detail applied to one of the gliders.  Well, actually, I did, but had to pull it off and discard the decal. 
Somehow, while applying the decal, one corner got slightly curled under.  When I pulled the decal up to fix it, the other end curled over as well and became hopelessly stuck.  By the time I got the decal straightened out using some fine tipped tweezers, it was toast. There was an unsightly crack in the decal, and part of the image was missing.
Trash.....
So, I have to add a replacement image to another blank decal sheet that will be sharing space with other upcoming rocket build markings.
Another small setback in getting the Lunar Patrol completed.
Live n 'learn...