Brief:
UFO, oddroc, practically ready to fly, 13mm motor, aerobrake recovery.

The Invader is a simple, almost ready to fly, entry level UFO rocket. It is made almost totally from Styrofoam and is really ready to fly except for the paint job and stickers.

Construction:
The "kit" consists of a foam UFO, a cardboard motor tube, some stickers and an Estes safety sheet. There was going to be less to this "build" than I had imagined.

There was no real construction. In fact, the rocket could have been flown plain without any paint. All that is really needed is to friction fit the motor tube. It's a blocked length of BT meant to protect the foam from ejection gases when the motor is spit.

I wanted to do something so I investigated the paint options.

Finishing:
The instruction make provision for spray painting but warn to test the paint first to make sure it does not attack the foam. I chose a maroon from Rustoleum and sprayed a bit on the back of my spray booth. I then wiped some up with my finger and applied it to a discreet piece of the foam. After a while, it looked as if this was a safe paint.

Still, to be cautious, I approached the spraying with a method I learned from Art Applewhite. I merely dusted the rocket with the lightest coating I could. After the pass, all I could see for my efforts were a few dark freckles. Hopefully, the paint was almost dry by the time is landed. I was dry 10 minutes later when I did the same thing. In this way, I slowly built the paint up providing complete coverage only after about a dozen light mistings. My hope was that as the paint underneath dried, it would form a protective barrier for later, heavier (but not heavy) sprays.

The first thing I did when the paint was dry was to test fit the plugged motor tube. The instructions say that the friction fit may need to be made with tape but that was not the case with mine. It fit in snugly.

I am not a great fan of crack and peel stickers but I expected nothing more from a kit of this type. I was pleasantly surprised at their quality. They lifted from the sheet without too much trouble and went into place and stuck well. I used the edge of a toothpick to burnish them and they seem like they will stay put alright.

Construction Rating: 4 out of 5

Flight and Recovery:
The only recommended motor is the A10-PT, but I didn't have any of those for the maiden outing. I loaded up first with an A10-3T. To help protect the foam from the ejection charge, I stuffed a piece of wadding in the top of the motor. The rocket was loaded, set on the pad and off it went, just as advertised. It didn't go too high, inverted, spit the motor and drifted down. Here is a bad video of the maiden flight can be seen here.

Just to push the boundaries a bit, I tried the next flight on a 1/2A3-2T. As expected, this one went even lower, but it did invert and spit the motor before the charge went off. Again, I had stuffed a piece of wadding in the ejection end of the motor and that seemed to work just fine. A video of the spectacularly low second flight can be seen here.

Flight Rating: 3 out of 5

Summary:
This rocket is not a grand piece of work, it's just something simple that can be flown in crowded situations with little time. That makes it worthwhile all by itself. Anyone can fly it and even a finishing moron like me can make it look fairly decent. Using a bit of wadding stuffed over the ejection charge increases the motor options as well.

Overall Rating: 3 out of 5