Issue link: https://www.e-digitaleditions.com/i/1466727
When I retired aer 36 years in the aerospace industry in April of 2019, little did I know that a year later, the whole coun- try, and perhaps the entire planet would be semi-retired with me! Like everybody else, I found myself with a lot of free time and kind of stuck at home. So much for all the museums, zoos, hikes, and other outdoor adventures that were occupying my re- tired time! Like many folks, I built a few of the more complex Lego models—but they don't fly! As I looked for things to do, I found that I had the components to build a 4" diameter Iris rocket that had been lying around for a few years. I figured that now was the time to start building. One thing led to another and the next thing I know, the home rocket factory was open. I started going into the upscale of classic Estes kits that my buddies and I flew in the mid- 70s. I built a Red Max, Cherokee-D, Black Brant, (old) Bandit, and Goblin (see Figure 1). Rocketry is a hobby that helps to bring people together. Most of the buddies that 28 MAY/JUNE 2022 SPORT ROCKETRY I flew with so many years ago are still my best friends today! In fact, my buddy David has now been drug back into the hobby by me! "Not guilty your honor." In a phone call with my buddy Mike, he recalled the little rocket that I had built with the ring-tail when we were kids. I thought that might be a challenge and started to model it up on a larger, 4" diameter scale in RockSim. At this point I should point out that I do not like adding nose weight, or any weight for that matter, to my rock- ets…it is just counter intuitive to me. Light is fast, period. As I sort of expected, the ring-tail moved the center of pressure back quite a bit on the rocket which meant that I may be able to build this thing without a bunch of noseweight (Figure 2). Now, how was I going to stuff a chute, shock cord and pis- ton in that relatively small space? I have be- come a big fan of the Public Missiles piston ejection system and have not had a failure yet, so this had to be part of my recovery Figure 1. My COVID fleet. by John Suarez NAR 81459 Photos by Author and David Lee The Ring Tailed SpRiTe The Ring Tailed SpRiTe The Ring Tailed SpRiTe