Brief:
An OOP rocket of the space shuttle. Estes have released a few other space shuttles that have been gliders. This older one is just the shuttle itself and recovers by a parachute. I got two of these older rockets from a rocketeer that was giving up the hobby. Both kits had been opened and had bits missing, however these were easily replaced. This review is for Estes kit number 1424, which seems to be identical to kit 1385. The difference between the kits is what came with the rocket.

Construction:
The kit consists of:

• Body tube, BT 60 K - 7 inch
• 2 balsa fin sheets
• Plastic launch lug
• nose cone and pods
• engine Mount tube
• Engine hook
• Die cut rings
• Die cut Card
• Shock cord
• Clay Weight
• Decal sheet
• Pattern sheet
• Shroud lines
• Tape disks
• 18-inch parachute

To build the kit I used:

• CA gel glue
• White wood glue
• Sand paper
• Primer
• White spray paint
• Black paint

The first thing I had to do was cut out a section of balsa wing that was missing. Having done this, I then checked to make sure all of the parts were there. Next was to swap parts for newer or better parts. The die cut rings were upgraded, the parachute swapped for a handmade rip stop nylon one, the shock cord changed for a length of Kevlar thread and a longer length of elastic cord, the clay weight had gone hard and brittle so that was swapped.

The instructions are of the typical Estes style, and the build is relatively straightforward. The wing is made up of 8 pieces of balsa that need to be glued together. In my kit the previous owner had already started this – badly. There was a lot of filling and sanding to be done. One gotcha here is to cut out the flaps that are done in step 17 after step 4 – it makes the job easier.

There are a few sheets of card that are used in the build which go on easily this is not true of the plastic OMS pods that have to be cut out and then glued into place. Heavy fillets of white glue were needed to give a good finish.

The flaps that are added are there to give a straight boost.

Finishing:
The balsa in the kit was a varying quality and required three coats of sanding sealer and several layers of primer, with sanding between coats, the body tube had deep spirals in it. The rocket was coated with white spray paint and then had the black paint applied by brush. I'm not good at painting and I took some liberties with the design. Despite the decals being old and of the water slide variety, some went on okay, but unfortunately some disintegrated when they came off the backing paper. In hindsight I should have clear coated them before trying to apply them.

Construction Rating: 3 out of 5

Flight:
Recommended motors are: A8-3, B4-4, B6-4, B8-5, C6-5.

The first, and last flight was on a B6-4, after a climb of about 10 foot it arched and flow horizontal until crashing into the ground under full thrust. The motor mount was badly damaged. I was able to reset the mount, but in doing so damaged the body tube.

The motor had failed to set off its ejection charge, and when I looked at the launch photo, the thrust jet seems to be angled a few degrees off. The motor was probably the cause of the arching.

After repairing the shuttle, she had a few more flights.

Sticking with C6-3s she performed better, but each flight was far from perfect, she shimmers on the boost, and always arches slightly. A delay of 5 seconds is too long given her arched flights, I would not fly her on an A motor either.

Recovery:
With one bad flight I am tempted to tank the review points, but other rocketeers have flown this model without problems. My first flight was due to a bad motor.

Recovery is fine on the parachute size provided

Flight Rating: 2 out of 5

Summary:
She's a nice looking model, but not a great flyer, I have another one in my build pile but I doubt if I'll put that one to the top of the build list.

Overall Rating: 3 out of 5