Manufacturer: | Giant Leap Rocketry |
Pic Courtesy of Giant Leap
Brief:
Single stage, minimum diameter, hpr, with 24" Parachute. Optional SlimLine
motor retainer, 29mm adaptor, Kevlar®
shock cord, Kevlar®
chute protector.
Construction:
Kit contains:
Pros: GiantLeap Rocketry's kit is as advertised, easy to build. Kit arrived promptly, packaged well. Instructions were easy to follow. After some prep sanding simply epoxy the fin can onto the body tube leaving room to tape an engine in or for the optional SlimLine retainer. Attach the shock-cord to the piece of all thread running through the coupler then epoxy the coupler into the tube. Epoxy on the conformal launch lugs. Attach the Kevlar® pad, chute and nose cone and you're done. All in all and extremely sturdy and easy to build kit. Other than the standard supplies (epoxy, filler, sand paper, paint) you will need a rod long enough to reach inside the tube about 30 inches to apply epoxy and push the coupler (shock mount) into the body tube. Fit was virtually perfect with very little sanding needed.
Cons: Just the standard with almost all kits, the stock nose cone attachment is useless.
Construction Rating: 4 out of 5
Flight/Recovery:
Since the kit is so rugged it is designed to come back down quickly on a
24" chute. Because of the small diameter I used the optional Kevlar®
shock cord and Kevlar®
heat pad to eliminate the need for wadding. No damage to the fins or tube on
landing.
The only problem during its first launch on a Pro38 1 Grain was one I expected. In the rush to get ready for the launch I skipped adding an eyebolt to the nose cone and used the stock connection and had the nose cone part company during deployment.
Flight Rating: 4 out of 5
Summary:
This kit truly is almost ready to fly. An easy build for a new BAR such as
myself. Previous to this kit I had only built a LOC-IV (thanks to the
reviews here I beefed up the fins and they stayed put even after coming down
directly on one fin). More experienced fliers will still enjoy the
performance potential of this minimum diameter kit (10,000' on a J350).
First flight was on a Pro-38 1 Grain with a 7 sec delay which was almost
right at apogee. With the smaller motor the rocket was over-stable and did
weather cock in the wind (around 15-20 at launch) not helped by the fact I
angled the launch rod. I suggest upgrading to the Kevlar®
shock cord and
Kevlar®
heat pad for the chute. Due to the 38mm body tube its much easier
not having to fuss with wadding. I also opted for the slim-line retainer
(works and looks great) and the 29mm adapter. If you're looking for an easy
to build, high performance, yet able to take abuse rocket you should
consider this kit.
Overall Rating: 4 out of 5
Brief: The Giant Leap Thunderbolt38 is a minimum diameter "almost ready to fly" high power rocket. By keeping the parts list as simple as possible, this rocket could be built and ready to fly in a single, rather short build session--especially for a high power rocket. However, despite the simplicity of the design, I would not consider this to be a good choice for someone ...
(by Herb Estus - 06/10/02) Brief: 38mm minimum diameter rocket that can be flown with anywhere from an F50 with the optional 29mm adaptor to a 38mm J350. Construction: 8" Ogive nosecone 38mm Acme Fin can 48" 38mm non-brittle phenolic tubing 2" coupler with a metal roll pin for shock chord attachment 1/4" Acme conformal launch lugs 12' of ...
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