Building Tips

Tips for Building the Designs

In every rocket design, no matter how simple or complex, there are a few common assembly steps that remain constant, such as putting together a parachute or a typical motor mount. This page is a special resource for those common steps, broken out from their normal place on the instruction sheet, and treated separately. The intent is to simplify the design process for other designers, relieving them of the burden of having to document every step in the process.

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Tip	Description	Submitted By:
18mm Motor Mount	How to build a 18mm motor mount.	Craig McGraw
24mm Motor Mount	How to build a 24mm motor mount.	Craig McGraw
Canopy Jig	Shows how to make canopies for your rockets.	Craig McGraw
Long 24mm Motor Mount	How to build a long 24mm motor mount.	Craig McGraw
Long "E" 24mm Motor Mount	How to build a long "E" 24mm motor mount.	Craig McGraw
Medium "E" 24mm Motor Mount	How to build a medium "E" 24mm motor mount.	Craig McGraw
Long 13mm Motor Mount	How to build a long 13mm motor mount.	Craig McGraw
Multi-Stage Fin Alignment	A tool to help you easily align multi-stage fins.	Craig McGraw
120-Degree Fin Jig	A fin alignment fixture for 120-degree 3-fin or 6-fin designs.	Craig McGraw
3.5in x 18mm Pop-Pod	A Pop-Pod for use on Boost Gliders.	Craig McGraw
Original T-Bird Fin Set	A set of fin patterns that were derived from the 1964 Centuri catalog for the T-Bird. This represents the FIRST version of this model, with the raked fins, as opposed to the simplified 1970's version which is represented in the plans on JimZ.	Craig McGraw
Model Rocket Shock Absorbers (Yitah Wu Design) Model Rocket Shock Absorbers (John Rolph Design)	Landing forces are often as harsh as the acceleration from the pad. Model rockets with fin pods, or other landing pads, tend to receive more damage when contacting the ground under canopy due to sideways forces caused by drift. Yitah Wu and John Rolph came up with these designs for landing pad shock absorbers to counteract those landing forces.	Yitah Wu & John Rolph
Starship Vega Fin BNC-5AX Starship Vega Combo BNC-5AX	Full-size templates for Starship Vega, using a BNC-5AX nose cone outline for pod cutout. One image is the fin by itself, the other is the all-up layout with the pod in place.	Craig McGraw
Starship Vega Fin BNC-5AW Starship Vega Combo BNC-5AW	Full-size templates for Starship Vega, using a BNC-5AW nose cone outline for pod cutout. One image is the fin by itself, the other is the all-up layout with the pod in place.	Craig McGraw
PNC-50BB / BNC-50BB Nose Cone	Pattern for the 50BB cone used in the Starship Vega. Cutting values for BMS: SHAPE = 7 SIZE = 6 L = 5.500 A = 1.000 Q = 0.976 I = 0.950 M = 0.875	Craig McGraw
Andromeda Ring Sheet	Here's the Estes Andromeda die-cut sheet as lifted from the plan scans. I have adjusted the size of the image so that it prints out full size. The rings are CR-5055, and that's what I scaled the whole image to.	Craig McGraw

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