Estes - Cosmic Cobra {Kit} (1262) [2002-2008]

Contributed by David Sindel

Construction Rating:
Flight Rating:
Overall Rating:

Diameter:	1.33 inches
Length:	19.50 inches
Manufacturer:	Estes
Skill Level:	1
Style:	Helicopter

Brief:
The Cosmic Cobra is a low power rocket that recovers in 2 pieces: the nose cone returns on helicopter-like blades and the body tube recovers by parachute.

Construction:
The kit contains:

1 12" yellow body tube
2 piece fin can
nose cone with 3 helicopter blades
12" chute

This kit was easy to build and took less than one hour to complete.

Finishing:
No finishing was required. The kit comes with a cool decal.

Construction Rating: 5 out of 5

Flight:
First flight was on a B6-2. Great flight but even with 5 sheets wadding, it was too much for the parachute.

Second flight was on a C6-3 and 6 pieces of wadding. Higher fligth but same result with the parachute.

Third flight was on a B6-4, which is too long of a delay, causing the rocket to eject from only 70ft up. However, with 8 sheets wadding it recovered safely.

I like that it has good, stable flights but don't use B6-4 or C6-5 motors.

Recovery:
PROs: the helicopter nose is cool and is more than likely to work well.

CONs: it needs 8 sheets wadding to keep from burning the parachute.M/P>

Flight Rating: 4 out of 5

Summary:
The Cosmic Cobra is a cool first or second rocket. For less than $12, it's a great deal. Get this rocket!

Overall Rating: 4 out of 5

Other Reviews

Flights

Comments:

G.A.D. (September 3, 2002)

We have had a hard time figuring out how to get a good clean deployment from this rocket. On the first flight the nosecone separated but the ?copter blades barely had time to fold out. The parachute was partially melted and failed to deploy fully. The second flight was a good one. On the third flight the combination of chute and ?copter blades was too much to eject and it lawn-darted. [Note to EMRR, I'll send a Pic] I'm considering how rebuild this for more consistent ejection. I may lengthen the body tube and use a piston of some sort.

J.R. (December 11, 2003)

I think this is an excellent rocket. It's fun to fly and watch this rocket's recovery. Especially on a C6-5. The parachute melting annoyed me a lot though.

unknown (December 18, 2003)

This is a great rocket. But it's basically a E2X version of the Hyper X.

F.H. (April 6, 2004)

The picture above looks EXACTLY like mine after just one flight. Everything just packs way too tight. If Estes replaces this kit I will build it with a streamer to reduce the amount of stuff to pack into the body tube.

B.A. (March 8, 2006)

Once you get the knack of how to lead the blades and a chute, this is a great rocket. All of the kids love it, and I've had the nosecone take over 2 minutes to come down at times.

M.S. (October 23, 2006)

After a couple of failures using the rotors, we have scrapped the helicopter retrieval completely and added a streamer to all 3 Cosmic Cobras that my kids own. Much easier to load and higher percentage of recovery. We have flown one of the Cobras at least 15 times. They all look like they will last a long time. With less weight, a C motor makes a really nice flight!

J.G. (June 15, 2008)

This rocket is what I refer to as a "Titanic". Very first flight was also its last flight. I read the flight logs and reviews prior to flying this, and for some reason, thought mine was going to work. It didn't. There is just too much stuff to cram into a BT-56 tube here. Others that witnessed the ballistic arc that our rocket did (when ejection charge failed to even get the nosecone out) said "that must have been a Cosmic Cobra". Tells you something. The suggestions we got were that this rocket needs to be "stretched". We concur. A longer body tube will allow for chute to be packed underneath the folded helicopter blades. Stay tuned in the mods section.

G.P. (June 25, 2008)

I'm not sure why some people are having trouble with this rocket - I've had good recovery every time. The trick is to fold and roll the parachute in a long wedge so that it fits inside the rotors. This was my mom's favorite of all my rockets - she loved watching the rotor/nose cone deploy and autogyro down.

C.G. (July 2, 2008)

As G.P. said, you need to fold the parachute rather flat and place it between the rotors. My daughter has one and has never had a bad deployment. However, the nose cone doesn't spin all that well in the default build; it starts to spin, then flips over, then starts to spin again, and so on. I resolved this by putting a few grams (probably around 15) of weight in the tip of the nosecone, enticing it to remain pointed downward for a more satisfying spin.

Wallace Jones (July 27, 2011)

Very first flight lifted off slowly after a longer than usual ignition delay. Nose cone separated at apogee, all fins deployed for a nice autogyro descent. Rocket body was not so fortunate. Parachute shroud lines were severed by the ejection blast (due to lack of wadding on my part). Rocket survived with just a small dimple in the tube. Parachute was never found. I plan to replace the lost chute with a streamer or small chute and use more wadding next time. I think the provided decal makes the rocket look gaudy. I would suggest leaving it off . My rotor blades were purple, which helped visibility during descent. I like this rocket, no curse here (except for that hidious decal).

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