Upscale X-Ray and Apogee II builds
 

These are may latest from a rainy Saturday afternoon.

The X-Ray
It was always a favorite of mine but as always when you grow up it seemed so darn small. ;)

So I upscaled it by 138%! (pics 1 and 2)

The Payload bay is a BT-56 size clear plastic tube from a Super Nova Payloader. The 138% upscale for the main body, originally a BT-20 comes out to 1.02". I used a SEMROC ST-10 tube (1.04" O.D.). The heavy duty 24mm motor tube from Totally Tubular fits nice inside an ST-10. :D

The Apogee II
Another favorite but way too easy to lose an minimum diameter 18mm model so it was upscaled by 183%. (Pics 3 and 4)

There is about a 1.5" gap for staging 24mm motors. Hmmmm...I think I may lose that one if I go D12-0 to an E9-8. :cool:

Yes I turned all the custom balsa parts...hey that's what I do!

I do have to order some decals for these yet but with the weather lately I guess there is no rush.

A good chioce. I've thought about a BT-60 upscale (ie, bashing a Big Bertha) , but you end up with about a half acre of booster fins. I did end up bashing a Big Betty into a quasi Apogee-II upscale, but built the booster shorter than scale and omitted the payload section. http://home.flash.net/~samily/betty-bash/bet-gee2.jpg

The BT-56 upscale makes lots more sense, and you get to have a bonafide clear payload section.

I don't see vent holes for the gap staging. Are you going to add them? Or perhaps you vented it aft?

Stock Apogee-II markings are "NASA" and "USA". You might be able to get those from some generic decals, maybe out of your stash or from the decal sheets Estes makes (or recently made).

Doug

Thanks, Doug,

I'll add the vent holes later. I normally use a paper punch to do them. It makes nice round holes. :D

As for decals well, I have to think about what I want to do and a color scheme. Decals are a long way off.

I have a few of the decals left from a BT-56 sized D-13 decal set from Excelcior and some other "stuff". Plus I have that whole big silkscreened sheet of decals from Sirrus.

Yea, I have lots of decals yet.

There's a BT-60 version up on BARCLONE, drawn back in 2003 (I think...:o )...

Apogee I: http://barclone.rocketshoppe.com/de...xi_Apogee_I.rkt
Apogee II: http://barclone.rocketshoppe.com/de...i_Apogee_II.rkt

The Apogee came from the old school of design thought (pre-RockSim ;) ) where bigger fins meant better stability. Simple, maybe effective, but not really optimized.