Estes Industries did a wonderful job hosting the NARAM-65 Estes Family Day on Saturday, August 3, 2024. Estes provided free Make It Take It model rocket kits for the kids in the shade of their big yellow and white on-site tent at the Hudson Ranch launch field. The kids really enjoyed building and flying them! It was a great success!

Kind regards,
Jeff Jenkins
aka: Faithwalker
NAR #46879 SR

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While I was away at NARAM-65, one of my grandsons turned two years old. Fortunately, we got to celebrate his birthday early with his cousin, who happens to be my other grandson, who also turned two, before my NARAM trip. For their two year old birthdays, I began to introduce them to rocketry with a stomp rocket. They both loved it! It blessed my heart to see the smiles on their faces and gave me great joy to see how they had lots of fun with it!

Edit: I know the second and third photos here appear sideways, but when you click on them, they rotate right side up!

Kind regards,
Jeff Jenkins
aka: Faithwalker
NAR #46879 SR

Attached Thumbnails

     

That model is physically identical to the Cosmic Ray, which is on the Estes Education site (but not currently on the main estesrockets.com site). The colors of the parts are different, but it is otherwise the same model.

They used those for giveaways at the World Spacemodeling Championships last summer in Austin and a bunch of them were assembled and flown during the week.

At one point during the WSMC they had a contest amongst the various national teams to see who could assemble and get one of these ready to fly the fastest. The catch was that the team member who was doing the actual assembly was blindfolded, and some other member of the team had to look at the pictorial instructions and talk his/her team member through the assembly. It was a hoot to watch.

I don't remember which team won the contest, though.

The model itself is a nice mix of the BT-50 three fin ARF fin can, three fins that are very close in shape to those used on the Alpha, and a colored (blue in this case) version of the blow-molded nose cone currently used on the Alpha. The body tube is just enough longer than that on the Alpha III to make it a little easier to get enough wadding and the 'chute in it.

And it goes together with no glue required, which is a plus when working with first-timers these days.

__________________
Bernard Cawley
NAR 89040 L1 - Life Member
SAM 0061
AMA 42160
KG7AIE