MRC Concept II kits
I have an opportunity to build a few MRC Concept II kits. I’d never heard of them until now.
Anybody know anything about them? |
Lots of people on here seem to like them.
I found them to be inferior to most all other mainstream brand kits; Semroc, Estes, Centuri, etc. |
How do you say no to that? Especially if it's a Trailblazer or Iron Man. :cool:
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The kits are: Trailblazer, Standard Arm, and Thermal Hawk Glider.
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The Standard Arm also looks cool. I'm not the one to talk to concerning gliders. ;)
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The Standard ARM in that line is the only one having any appeal.
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2 Attachment(s)
Cloned the Trailblazer.
Have parts bagged to clone the standard ARM and 2X2. Unique aspect of the Concept II were the motors: Tracker motor produced dense smoke. FX motors produced smoke and little thrust for billowing clouds prior to launch. Special ignition system would light the smaller FX outboard motors first. A few seonds later the main motor would light. Interchangeable mounts: 24mm, 18mm, 18mm w/FX motors. MRC Tracker and FX motors come up occasionally on EBay. Haven't tried them. Don't know if I want to. ;) |
They had a lot of interesting features for the time, I built a Standard Arm, Ironman and Flare Patriot when they came out, I also got the Controller which has a separate circuit for the FX “motors”, and can use batteries but had a nice connector for a 7.2 v nicad. I also got the pad. The pad came with a plastic rail, but the base will also accept a rod. The launch lugs on the kits are C shaped in cross section and could use the rail or a rod. The tubing is robust and on most of the kits is 1.75” od, so the rockets can’t easily be repaired. Most kits come with three interchangeable motor mounts, an 18mm mount with fx mounts, an 18mm mount, and a 24mm mount. The 1.75” kits had molded plastic fins. The bad of this revolves around the motor mount/fin attachment. The motor mount host is a plastic ring with small projections that the single plastic centering ring mount slots through and is locked with a twist. Ejection charge particles rain down on the plastic centering ring and can deform it over time. The fins have a tiny tab that slots into a tiny slot in the host ring, so the rest of the fin joint is plastic to paper. These are nice biggish rockets that look great, but I have had the mount fuse in one and have had numerous fins lost on normal landings. The Ironman is larger, and has balsa fins, so it doesn’t have the fin problem of the others but does have the interchangeable mounts. There is a lot of history here about the company if you search.
LS-102 2x2 MRC LS-103 Flare Patriot MRC LS-100 Ironman MRC LS-103 Flare Patriot MRC LS-101 Standard Arm MRC LS-140 Thermal Hawk Glider MRC LS-104 Trailblazer MRC I used the smoke motors back then and they were fun. As reported by others, not a ton of smoke and you had to do it on a calm day. I had a C Cato in the standard Arm, damaging it but it still can fly. An FSI D20 blew the Flare Patriot to pieces, I had a line on a replacement tube here but didn’t follow up. The Ironman is still Ok but retired. |
The Thermal Hawk is a good glider for B and maybe C motors. The plastic part in the front of the fuselage makes getting the wings aligned and attached fairly simple. I have managed a one minute glide on a B4-2. I am sure that most of the glider gurus will be able to get longer glide times.
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I built the Iron Man and think it's a great kit. A lot of features that no other kits had back in the day.
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