AVI Astroport plans
 

Arley brought this up over on the Estes forum, and it's the only scrap of info that seems to be available out there.
http://www.oldrocketplans.com/pubs/...6/avi1976-4.pdf
Apparently AVI had plans to do a UFO series. (Skip down to page 4.) Pretty interesting looking group of birds. Does anyone know if plans exist or ever existed? I'd hate to see something like this lost.

Those are some interesting designs. I'd love to see more about them as well, if available.

On a side note, the one AVI plan that is online is here at YORS;
http://www.oldrocketplans.com/avi/aviAX-1/aviAX-1.htm

Anyone ever built/cloned one of these? It would be very interesting to see a picture or two...

Later,
EV

Remind me...
 

EV, I have one in original packaging, haven't built it yet, if you'd like to borrow it for measuring/cloning purposes. Remind me next time you're attending a club meeting or launch and I'll bring it along. :)

And, when you do get the cloning info, send me a copy please..... :rolleyes:

The AVI "UFO" series were pure vaporware. Some of the fictional aliens were described in AVI's newsletter.

The only AVI model that was announced and actually delivered was the Lineaus Gigantus, which was many lengths of T-20 tubing; up front was a transition section, maybe 6" of T-25, and an ogive plastic cone. On the rear was a standard "Pioneer" plastic fin can.

Dean,

I still need scans of the decals of this kit, if it has decals included.

Dean,

I'd love to get a look at the StarWarrior. You going to be at the next sod farm launch?


Stefan,

So the UFO series was never released. Do you know if there are any more drawings/etc. out there, or is that page in the AVI catalog it?


All,

If the the catalog page is it, can anyone send Scott a higher resolution scan? Five of the six header cards shown have a small line drawing on one side. That means potential for creating layouts that are reasonably close.

Thanks,
EV

I have a close clone that I built after finding the plans on this site. I built this rocket about 3 years ago and have flown it many times. It still needs decals though as I have never been able to track them down.

I've done a clone of this, with the exception of the phasar tubes (couldn't find a 15mm tube, so I found a close approximation at BMS) and also made it a 24mm min diameter design. Haven't been able to paint it yet or find decals.

I'll be glad to provide decals as soon as somebody sends me or posts a scan.

I managed to track down and talk to Mike Bergenske a couple of months ago. Mike was the original owner, founder of AVI Astroport and he informed me that the original planed run for the Star Warrior was 5,000 kits but that only a little over 1,500 kits were actually produced and shipped. We talked for over half an hour about the old days. Sorry to say that he informed me that all records for the company were lost over the years. If anyone should happen to have a catalog, or one of the original kits, please scan and upload it. Hope this sheds a little more light on a great rocket from the past.

I live in northern Illinois and AVI was in southern Wisconsin, not too far from my house. A friend of mine was a pilot, as was I, and he needed to make a trip to Mineral Point to pick up a friend of his and fly him to St. Louis. He needed me to share in the flying and I was excited to visit Mineral Point.

We only have about a hour layover while waiting for his friend to arrive at the small airport. I had plans to look up AVIs address in the phone book and try to make a visit. I never found a listing for them and later found out that they had just gone out business!

I remember their broadsheet catalogs that had dozens of special motors in them and I was extremely dissapointed to not be able to visit them. How often does someone get a chance to fly to Mineral Point :)

I went through the city's Chamber of Commerce in order to track down a number for the owner of the company and had a very nice conversation with him a few months ago. I never did see a catalog but wish I had as there is no dought that I would had ordered one or more of there kits. I keep hoping someone here might have one they can upload.

Star Warrior
 

Here's a pic of mine.

I have a copy of the AVI Astroport Encyclog. Been meaning to scan it and hand the scan over to the YORF archives, but that project is just another can that I keep kicking down the road. I'm surprised that no one else has done this. If there is enough interest here on YORF, my arm could be twisted into getting this done quickly.
-W

Most of their stuff was 'vaporware'.
I do still have a few unfired 18mm Long-length D engines from AVI.
Have a few of their 10.5mm engines too.

I'm twisting! SAY "UNCLE!!!"

Define "quickly".
Define "twist".
;)

Quest sells 15 mm body tubes. MPC's Miniroc kits (the Pipsqueak, Delta-Katt, Super Star, Astrobee D, ASP-1, and Taurus-1) all used these tubes; BT-5/ST-5 tubes make a perfect "sleeve-fit" inside the 15 mm tubing to serve as 13 mm mini motor mount tubes. Most of these MPC Miniroc kits, by the way, will, if all goes well, soon be back in (small-scale) production, although I'm not at liberty to say any more for now, except that I'm helping their future producer to--as a certain starship captain was wont to say--"Make it so."

There was some expression of interest... so there's the twist.

"Quickly" is relative. I believe I now know what box contains the Encyclog. Next step is to retrieve the box, but only after I finish cleaning out the garage to make room for the Honda that needs a new engine. After I pull the old engine, replace it, r&r various parts of the front suspension, and get that Civic back on the road, I'll climb that ladder and retrieve the box. May have to sort through some old kits and sell them off for all of this.

-W

AVI Astroport Encyclog
 

I noticed where one of the AVI Astroport Encyclogs sold recently on ebay: http://www.ebay.com/itm/GIANT-AVI-m...g-/301192102875

It would be a wonderful tribute to model rocket enthusiasts everywhere to have a copy of this document scanned as a pdf document and available for viewing.

If anyone has a copy and is able to provide scans, that would be great.

Faithwalker,
Jeff Jenkins

Okay, I've been patient. Is "quickly" time up yet? :rolleyes: :D

I would politely suggest a bit more patience, having been in similar "life-keeps-getting-in-the-way-distractions" situations when I wanted to search for packed-away books, or write articles that I'd pledged to write, instead. Plus, did you "twist his arm?" That was part of his "quickly" clause... :-) (I'd never even *heard* of the AVI Astroport Encyclog until just now, but based on the description on the eBay auction page, it sounds like quite a large publication [I'm picturing something like an unabridged dictionary, that might rate its own reading lectern, like the ones in libraries...]).

I shook his hand a few years ago, so close. :D

I did quickly locate the Encyclog, and after leafing through the pages made certain that it is stored well.

The Enclyclog is a large-format document. Each page is ANSI C (17x22 inches) size. The Encyclog was actually printed on ANSI D size paper and folded in half to yield a 17X22 inch dimension page. I do not have access to a large format scanner. I've been on the lookout for one that I can access, but have not been successful. There's one in another department at work, but going to this place with the AVI Encyclog and scanning it while being scrutinized by neutral-to-hostile parties of another department within my organization is not a good option for me.

Not having access to a large-format scanner is the obstacle that I have not been able to surmount.

Maybe it's just as well... :-)

This definitely sounds like a work that deserves to be preserved and disseminated (online, if that's practical, given its size) so that everyone can benefit from it. Is it devoted entirely to that company, or to model rocketry in general, or does it cover rocketry and space flight history (up to its date of publication) as well? I'm afraid I can't help you with the large-format scanner, but maybe a local printer, public library, or university library has one that you could use? Alternatively, maybe some arrangement could be worked out where you work (doing it at a quiet time), or... Depending on your organization, maybe they would give it their official blessing if the online scans "advertised" them ("The preservation of this rare document was made possible by the kind assistance of...")?

DOH!! I had one of these back in the day - the AVI Astroport Encylog, not a large-bed scanner - and in a foolish burst of de-cluttering, disposed of it! What was I thinking? I suspect it was the last catalog to come out of AVI because shortly thereafter they went out of business. Had to have been back in the summer of 1978, or at the very latest '79.

I basically just wrote letters to every manufacturer listed in the appendix of the current (4th, I think) edition of the Handbook of Model Rocketry requesting a copy of their current catalog. Although I got a few "Return to Sender," it worked surprisingly well. That's how I "discovered" FSI.

Now I realize AVI was on its last legs,* and in fact one of the reasons I didn't care much for the catalog is that they were reselling Estes and (maybe) Centuri products I already had access to. One somewhat interesting point, to me, was that they were based in Mineral Point, Wisconsin, which was not that far from the Chicago suburbs where I lived, and we had actually stopped there on a family vacation a few years before to visit a museum.

As a very occasional poster and general keyboard jockey, I will refrain from giving any advice about scanning the Encyclog.

________
* Being, of course, the final incarnation of the company that had started as MRI, which had become MPC, which had become AVI when the guy who'd started MRI and sold it to General Mills to become the core of MPC then bought up the remaining MPC inventory when General Mills bailed, which seems to have kept AVI stocked with product for a good part of the mid-1970s. But the vein was mostly played out by the time I got the Encyclog....which I disposed of.

Funny, I did the same thing with the manufacturers in the Handbook. Not sure which edition I used, but it was a library copy. I know FSI was one that definitely replied, but I also remember several RTS envelopes that pissed my Dad off. (Not sure why. I used my own stamps from a roll I found laying soaked on the street. I took them home and dried them out, then just glued them on when needed. I even offered them to Mom and Dad, but I think Dad was afraid the PO would send them back because they were a little grungy looking.)

If your father grew up during the Depression, or even during World War II with its rationing, any waste--even of free, found items--was frowned upon; my parents would have reacted the same way, given the same circumstances and events. Also:

I first--and last--saw AVI Astroport listed (until I found Ninfinger Productions' website decades later) in a NASA publication that covered all of their current and planned activities (I believe it was called "This is NASA"). This was a 1978 or 1979 issue, which had an aerial view photograph of the Orbiter Enterprise descending toward the Edwards lake bed below as its cover illustration. The section on space-related educational activities of course covered model rocketry, and it also contained a list of manufacturers, which included AVI Astroport (which I'd never heard of and didn't know it had been MPC Model Rockets), Centuri, Estes, and--if memory serves--FSI. I wrote to AVI Astroport and got a "Returned To Sender," too... :-(

I did essentially the same thing--which still makes me wince whenever I think about it--with my copy of Richard Morrow's book "Small Sounding Rockets" (see: http://www.google.com/search?source...1.0.B2n3NVYnr8M ), which I abandoned at my old house down the street (along with many other things) when I moved to this apartment ten years ago. My storage space here was much smaller, I was in great and chronic pain, and I didn't expect--or want to--live much longer (so I didn't care much about anything in the future), so I let a lot of things just go. My neighbor, to whom I quit-claim deeded the house, tossed what I'd left there, which included flown Loki and Super Loki meteorological rocket motors and a Nike fin from the Poker Flat Research Range's "boneyard."

Nowadays your smartphone camera can stand in for a scanner and do fairly well if you can get the lighting right. And it should handle darn near any size document.

If you have an iPhone, they now have scanning built into the "Notes" app. Open a note, then hit the circled "+" button in the bottom middle, and then select "Scan document".

There are also many 3rd party apps that'll do this as well, on iOS or Android. After they take the photo, they correct for the perspective and the end result is pretty good.

Give it a whirl if you can, it's definitely better than nothing.

Thanks for the tip. This might do.

Using a phone to "scan" a large format document like the Encyclog sucked. The quality was just not there.

But I did finally get access to a large format scanner. I tried scanning and all it did was tear the first sheet. Ouch. The old newsprint is fragile and not up to being pulled through a scanner on rollers.

Thanks for trying, Wolf. Sorry you got a ripped page.

:( Bummed for you.

It tore along a where the sheet is folded in half, and only a bit. So it wasn't destroyed.

Here about a year and a half ago I got a large format scanner/printer to scan 11 x 17 page material, such as the larger instruction sheets/plans in some kits and the Centuri tabloid catalogs of the mid-to latter 70s. It has done an excellent job on those, though it is just a page at the time. No 'sheet feeder' for large tasks like that, nor would I want to even try a sheet feeder for those type scans.

It is Epson Model WF-7820 and I think I paid somewhere around $300 for it. Attached is a sample page scan out of one of the tabloid catalogs.

The condition of some pages of these old newsprint catalogs can be problematic at times and some pages just due to their condition require some cleanup after scanning. Especially pages that have multi colors printed on them. The newsprint has yellowed in a number of instances and getting good color scans of those pages takes some cleanup work afterwards. But then again, scanning documents of this type on pretty much ANY scanner would be time consuming and it is that for sure.

Earl

Other samples.

Earl