05 Shock Cord Mount
Well…for about $1.80 at Home Depot, I found the mounting hardware I needed. I tightened it down onto the top baffle plate and doused the nut with superglue.
Speaking of nuts, Evan stopped by to inspect my progress on “our” new rocket 
It occurs to me that I need a real camera–all of these shots are snapped with my daughter’s miniDV camcorder. It does great with video, but stills are not its strong suite.
Anyway here’s the plan. Put a ton of 30 minute epoxy around the inside of the tube coupler, cram the top baffle plate in, and hold it upside-down until it cures. It actually worked! Some epoxy seeped out of the small gap–but that just serves the purpose of filling in. Here’s what it looked like after the epoxy dried.
This morning I couldn’t even begin to budge it. I feel pretty confident about the joint. I need to–this joint is what will keep my rocket and expensive motor casing attached to the parachute.
On the subject of motor casings, after some time on r.m.r. I reset my RockSim to use the Rocksim calculations rather than Borrowman. My CG fears are gone. The stability should be fine, even with a G engine. So, I’m looking at the casings on DiscountRocketry and it looks like the Rouse-Tech 29/120 Reloadable Rocket Motor System (RT-29120M) is a good choice for about $43.00
However, HobbyConnection has Aerotech 29mm 40/120 for about $38.00, so that may be the better route. I mean, they did invent the Reloadable Motor System (RMS). And it’s cheaper.
In any case, either one will get me a maximum of a G64 which will take the Sirius to 2500ft. A one of the 180 casings would actually fit my abbrieviated motor mount (stupid!), and I could probably fly this rocket for Level 1 certification on a smaller H. But, I’ll probably do something different. I’ve learned quite a bit from this project–if I go for certification, I’ll probably want to go all out on a new rocket.
Next problem is the aft centering ring. It is 1/4″ plywood, making it too big for the 1/8″ notches in my fins. As you can tell from the next two pics.
I anguished over this last night. It would be easy just to ignore it and put it all together. It wouldn’t really detract from the looks…but it would bug me. So, how do I take out some of that fin material so this CR flushes out with the base of the rocket?
I thought about chewing it away with a jigsaw…but I wouldn’t be about to get close the motor mount. The best plan I could conceive was to do all I could with the jigsaw, and then file the rest away. I guess we’ll find out how that works out for me.
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