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This project was built in 2005 and was started because of Hawk Mountains project pack. The project pack was not the conventional sizes in rocketry but the 2.90" diameter body tube was only 0.040" wall thickness and is fiberglass! I had to use it for my next camera rocket. I couldn't decide to make it with a 38 mm motor mount and have motor ejection or go for the 54 mm and use an altimeter, I decided to make it modular and do both.

The fins were made from carbon/foam composite with round carbon rods on the edges. The 54 mm booster had slightly larger fins for the increased weight at the bottom of the rocket.

The only downside to the tubing was that the coupler tubing fit too loosly. I wrapped two layers of carbon tissue and vacuum bagged it for a perfect fit. I used coupler tubing for each motor mount section and the payload section.

After the carbond rod was glued with J.B. Weld, I used SuperFil to fill in the gap.

The fins were vacuum bagged with one layer of fiberglass to help hold the carbon rod on and to make for an overall smoother finish.

Here is a shot of the fins under vacuum. You can see the blooms of epoxy coming through the release material.

The fins were notched and the centering rings were glued in place. The centering rings were also made from carbon/foam material for the 38 mm motor mount.

The 54 mm motor mount centering rings were machined from 1/16" G10.

A foamboard jig was used for fine alignment while the fins were tacked in place with J.B. Weld.

The internal fillets were just J.B.Weld for the 38 mm motor mount.

The 54 mm motor mount was also set up with a foamboard jig. I used bunjee cord to apply tension to hold the fins in tight.

The external fillets were also J.B. Weld.

There was very little space between the 54 mm motor mount tube and the wall of the body tube so I used thin walled carbon tubing to act like a fillet. J.B. Weld was applied to the carbon tube and inserted. It fit very nicely touching the body tube, the fin, and the motor mount tube.

This photograph shows the activation switch, the camera timer, and the piezo elements inside the center of the payload coupler tube.

Inside the nose cone was the driver circuit for the locating piezo buzzers, the master on-off switch, and the batteries (not shown).

The fillets used were Superfil.

The motor retainer was from Aeropac for the 38 mm version.

The 54 mm motor retainer was home made.