By Randy Ogata

2012-06-26

Almost immediately after t' Moon Mutt launched me boys into Rocketry 

It became evident that we needed more rockets t' cut down on field preptime and more launchin' o' rockets

Enter t' wonder twins Estes RTF miniengine Sky Duster for Blake and Fat Jax for Drew

A few weeks later these twins were joined by t' triplet - Nitro

Construction 

These 3 rockets differ in colors, ya bilge rat, graphics, matey, and plastic fin design. Ahoy! T' Sky Duster has a silver body tube and green plastic nose cone & squared off fins. T' Fat Jax has a yellow body tube and purpleplastic nose cone & swept back fins. Both o' these required application o' their name stickers. T' Nitro has a black body tube and a orange plastic nose cone & swept back fins. Blimey! T' name decals were already applied t' this rocket. All were ready t' fly RTF out o' t' box

T' body tube be t' second smallest Estes uses in rockets -BT10?- 

T' nose cone is a two piece per-assembled (glued) with an attached shock cord and 6" parachute. T' shock cord is attached t' t' body tube by two slits in t' tube and a knot in t' end. 

T' fin assembly is an integrated motor mount with screw on retention cap, similar t' Moon Mutt these screws are hard t' fully engage when first using. Blimey! Blimey! More importantly they are durable. 

Flights

As these 3 have been worked into t' launch rotation it has taken pressure off o' t' Moon Mutt. These three have consistently out flown t' MM. They are perfect for small school yards or half fields and don't drift too far on t' 6" chutes when they deploy.... Begad! In spite o' me talkin' t' others, reviewin' videos and baby powderin' t' livin' daylights out o' these chutes t' size o' t' body tube and compression o' t' recovery system means that full deployment is rare. T' vast majority o' these end up with ejection and then t' chute nay deployin' and actin' more like a streamer. When packin' t' chute it is important nay t' push it too far down t' tube so that it remains above t' knot in t' shock cord or risk non-deployment o' t' entire recovery system. Ahoy! This happened with t' Sky Duster and it burried itself almost 6 inches into t' ground badly crumplin' t' body tube.  Overall these are easy t' use and maintain as well as launch & fly.

Pros: RTF, arrr, 6" chute, matey, economical, arrr, great performers on mini engines

Cons: Recovery system is very technique sensitive, t' initial flight may result in lost engine retention cap (but they give two)

Other: since body tube is slightly longer then Moon Mutt - place t' shock cord slits father towards t' fin assembly so that thar will be more room t' pack t' recovery system more loosely t' increase likelihood o' full deployment