One from the Storage Locker

It was hot. Very, very hot. Laurie and I sat in our car on the Frisco field, not really knowing what to expect. A van pulled up next to us. A buzzard spontaniously combusted overhead. It was time....

Except that it wasn't. The long day of waiting had actually just started. I guess it really started a few weeks before when Jack Sprague mentioned that he had been approached by Storage Wars Texas to help with an episode. He knew that Laurie and I had experience with the crazy world of storage auctions (actually, they are boring and a TON of work....just sayin') and he wondered if we might be interested in showing to watch and possibly help out.

We said, "Sure!" and that lead to us sweating the day away while all the while trying to stay out of the way of the cameras and production folks. It became quickly obvious that they wanted Jack as their star, and even Suzy needed to be invisible, so we literally hid behind things as filming occurred. Still, it was fun to watch when we could peek out.

A few random thoughts: It takes a long time to film even a short segment. It takes a whole lot of folks to do it. The production team was pretty nice. The stars from the show didn't say much to us (although Bubba seemed to like to talk a bit more). I really don't think they knew what to expect out of the rockets. Yes, I said rockets, as in more than one. They actually flew a couple.

So, all in all, I think it went well. We had fun (in a hot, slightly dull way), and we got to see a side of reality tv that a lot of folks don't. I think Jack represented us well, and even though on the episode they were putting out "nerd alerts" because of the rockets, we came off looking pretty darn cool!

By the way, if you missed the episode, here ya go!

http://www.aetv.com/storage-wars-texas/video/excuse-me-i-think-you-re-stupid-64645699873

 

Jack and the crew setting up. That's a lot of folks you don't see on the show!

More settin' up goin' on!

 



You might think that this screen grab is a picture of Jack. You would be wrong. The real reason I put this in here is the tree in the upper right hand side of the background. If you could chop that tree down you would find Laurie, Suzy, and me hiding there. We missed stardom by that much!


 

When Jack cautioned the camera guy about possibly frying his camera to get this shot, he was informed that "cameras are cheap" Ok, so donate a few to the club!


 

The three amigos!



Of Plastic Men and Final Frontiers

One of the advantages of doing a weekly blog is that you can cover topics that may not be directly related to your main topic. This week’s post is a case in point. A couple of posts ago I commented on how Disney inspired the U.S. government’s space program. Today, I’m going to talk about how that space program inspired everyone else.

One of the coolest things about being a “child of the 60’s” is the toys. Sure, we didn’t have video games and such, but it didn’t matter. We had real toys that did real things. Our toys were massive and flashy and, in the case of many of them, futuristic!

The baby boom of the late 50’s met with the space race of the 60’s to give us such great lines as Major Matt Mason, Billy Blastoff, and Mighty Zeroids. Of course this was also the golden age of model rocketry, with many timeless designs being released every year. On TV, Star Trek was blasting through “the final frontier.”  It truly was a great time to be a red blooded American space-lovin’ kid!

One of my favorite toys from the time was the GI Joe space capsule. It was huge and hefty, and after daring space exploits could actually survive a splashdown! As for what it actually did, well, not a lot. It held a 12 inch Joe (decked out in his Jiffy Pop inspired foil space suit). It floated. And, that’s about it. However, I can assure you that mine travelled millions of miles through my imagination. The fact that it was a pretty good approximation of a real Mercury capsule helped keep the fantasy alive.

I got my capsule when I was a kid on Christmas, 1967. I played with it for years, until it suffered a particularly hard reentry and broke off a nozzle.  After that, I think it fell victim to a garage sale and was gone. Cue mournful music.



Me and my cousin, Tamra, on Christmas, 1967

 

However, years later, we were blessed with something called Ebay. On Ebay, you can find anything (and seller blue_art_dog sells great stuff…shameless plug) Anyway, I was able to get a replacement capsule that was in pretty good shape, for a pretty good price! It now sits proudly in my display case. And yes, I do play with it occasionally…

The Mighty GI Joe Space Capsule

The business end

 

The real business end



The finest in space age plastic seating and restraints

The controls that could take Joe to anywhere in the universe!

 

My First Upscale. The Story of The Scamp

With the DARS Classic IX behind us, I got to thinking about the subject of upscaling. I personally enjoy taking classics and blowing hem up from standard size to mid power size. For some reason, mid power seems to be the proper size to go with these models (not that I haven’t seen wonderful large scale models from Scott Cook and others!) but mid power (to me anyway) gives enough “adult heft” to the model without losing any of the original charm.

Over the years I have upscaled several models, including my Estes Pegasus, Centuri Vector V, and Estes Colonial Viper (which was actually a kit from Morerockets.com). These have all been fun and challenging, but I have a special place in my heart for my first upscale, the Estes Scamp.

The Estes Scamp was originally released in 1973 as a “Cold Power” (read: “Freon Powered”) model. It lasted for a total of one year, and then vanished until 1977 when it was reintroduced as a standard model using 18mm motors. The Scamp stood 13.75 inches tall and was BT-50 based.

The Scamp as Cold Power-1973 (thanks to ninfinger.com)

The Scamp returns in 1977 (thanks to ninfinger .com)

The yellow and black styling of the Scamp (not to mention the Groovy Goul decals) made a cousin to the slightly more recognizable A-20 Demon and the ever popular Goblin. I’m not sure why they thought “Scamp” was synonymous with goblins and demons, but it actually kind of works. I always liked the look of the Scamp, but, unlike the Demon and the Goblin, never actually owned one “back in the day.”

I based my upscale on BT-60 because…well…it’s what I happened to have sitting around. I already had the tubing and nose cone (I think from a long lost Mean Machine) and I bought some 1/8 inch aircraft ply for the fins. The decals were easy enough to make with my printer using Testors decal paper and sealer. One note here; I actually made a decal that didn’t exist on the original model. It’s the one with the model name on it. I just liked the way it looked. I used Jimz http://www.spacemodeling.org/JimZ/index. for my reference materials and decal sheets.  The motor mount is 29mm…just because I could. She stands about 24 inches tall.

Originally I put on standard sized launch lugs, but then I realized that I was putting a  huge motor in there so I upscaled them as well. The original lugs are still there, but they are just for show. I made my own motor retention system from stuff I had about the house, and there ya go!

The Maxi Scamp!

The side featuring the heavy duty lug and the custom decal

The business end

A slightly less gray me at NSL 2006

I have flown the Maxi Scamp exactly once, at NSL at McGregor. I used an Aerotech G80 that blew that sucker right out of sight. I thought I would never see it again, but it was returned by a kind woman who had it drift in front of her car on a road about two miles away! Ever since then, I haven’t had the nerve to fly it again.

So there you have it. I threw my first upscale together with stuff I found in my rocket junk boxes, and not much more. It just goes to show you that upscaling doesn’t have to be very difficult or expensive.

Until next time, fly ‘em fast and high!



Every Store is a Rocket Store...

The title of this post is a (more or less) quote from our esteemed president, Jack Sprague, The idea, of course, is that no matter where you shop there is always something you can use for rocketry. Sometimes, however, stores that you wouldn't think are rocket stores actually carry them! For example, I got his e-mail from Sam Barone:

Estes Rockets at Fry's in Plano
Quite a few kits and motors.  Estes/Aerotech composites, lots of E9-6 and –9’s, and D12-0’s.  Blurry cell phone pictures follow.   For the blog.

And here are said "blurry cell phone pictures:"

As you can see, they have an assortment that actually seems to rival Hobby Lobby. Definitely worth checking out!

This brings us to another point I wanted to make. It's easy to contribute to the blog! See with one sentence and some quick pics, Sam has become the first guest contributor! Yea Sam!!!

So until next time; fly 'em fast and high!