Brief:

• Single-stage 3FNC with cool bat wings.
• Length: 24.5"
• Diameter: 1.3"

My daughter won this kit, donated by Sunward, in an EMRR Virtual Contest. Dan Westley has already written a very good review of this kit, so we're just going to cover the areas that were different for us.

Construction:

Materials: Dan has a comprehensive parts list, so I won't repeat it here. The Moondance uses the same nose cone with a bubble canopy that is used on all the Sunward "fighter-jet" kits. It's great on the fighters, but looks a little out of place on this kit.

The 18" blue and white parachute is made from a very durable plastic, thicker than standard Estes chutes. The shroud lines are also much stronger than normal.

The engine mount uses the same L-screw engine hook that Sunward uses on all their kits. It is strong enough to hold the engine firmly in place during ejection, but easily pivots out of the way when replacing engines.

The balsa fins with the bat wing shape are what really make this kit unique. The laser cutting was very well done, and the parts popped cleanly from the sheet with minimal sanding required. The balsa quality was very good, but awfully thin. I was concerned about the fragility of the fins, and my concerns turned out to be well founded. The sharp points on the fins will dig into soft materials (like seat cushions). I found this out when I split a fin lengthwise while loading the car after a day of flying. Easily repaired with CA, but thicker balsa or some other method of reinforcement should be considered.

Assembly: The directions are very straight-forward and a beginner should have little problems. Like Dan, we also used the Quest-style method of attaching a Kevlar shock cord anchor through the front hole in the engine mount and securing it with 5-minute epoxy. We also used 5-minute epoxy to install the engine mount in the body. It worked very well.

I have seen plain rubber shock cords crumble to dust as they age, so instead we used 1/4" elastic, twice as wide as standard Estes cord. I tied it to the Kevlar anchor cord with a double sheet bend knot, which is ideal when one cord is much thicker than the other.

The instructions called for the shock cord and the parachute shroud lines to all be inserted through a small hole in the base of the nose cone. I was afraid that enlarging the hole enough to fit all that would make the surrounding material too weak, so I tied a loop in the shock cord and attached the parachute with a large snap swivel. This also gives the nose some shock protection when the chute snaps open, and reduces the chance of separation.

Finishing:

The cover art shows a purplish color for the body, but this kit just begs to be painted Halloween pumpkin orange. We used two coats of Rustoleum Painter's Choice Real Orange. The spirals on the tube were so light we did not even bother to fill them.

The nose cone was painted with two coats of Rustoleum Painter's Choice Green to complete the pumpkin motif. Before painting, we wet-sanded it with wet/dry sandpaper, then let it dry for a day.

Fins were painted with two coats of Zynolyte Spray-Mate brand gloss black paint. I hate this stuff! I stocked up when it was on sale for 99 cents per can, and I can't wait to get rid of the last of it. It looks fine, but the smell is awful. We painted the fins outdoors and brought them inside after they were dry, but they still stunk several days later.

I find it a lot easier to get a good crisp color seam by painting the body and fins separately before attaching them. To do so, I attach a wide piece of masking tape to a board sticky-side up and stick the fins to that. After the paint dries, just peel off the fins, rough up the root edge with sandpaper and epoxy them to the body tube. We used an Estes fin alignment guide to hold the fin in place while the 5-minute epoxy dried. We did not use the reinforcing tabs supplied with the kit.

Decals are peel-and-press, and are of good quality. The glaring eyes on the nose cone combine with the bat wings to give a menacing look. The background is white but the edges are clear, so any base paint color will work without trimming the stickers microscopically close.

Construction Rating: 4 out of 5

Flight:

The manufacturer's recommend engine list is a bit confusing. The list on the cover art says B6-2(first flight), B6-4, C5-3, C6-5, and C6-7. The instruction sheet says B6-2(first flight), B6-4, B8-5, and C6-5. The web site says "B6-4 to C6-7 single stage engines".

My daughter has never had a rocket last more than 3 flights without either vanishing (Mosquito on a 1/4A) or drifting away (Viking on a B6), so she was very paranoid about losing another one. The Moondance is far bigger and heavier than those others and the nearest trees were at least 3 blocks away, but she still wouldn't let me load anything bigger than a B.

For the maiden flight we used a B4-4. Engine installation was very quick with a simple twist of the L-shaped retainer hook.

The breeze was about 5-10 mph, so we tilted the rod about 10 degrees into the wind. Nice slow liftoff, angling into the wind. Parachute opened just past apogee. The rocket descended gently, with minimal spinning or swinging, and came right back to us. It landed gently in the grass about 4 feet to the right of the pad. Perfect flight!

With four sheets of the Estes wadding stuffed down in the body and one sheet wrapped around the chute, we still got a small scorch on the chute.

I couldn't talk her into flying it any more that day. What a chicken!

Flight Rating: 5 out of 5

Summary:

This is a very nice kit with cool bat fins and decals.

After seeing this kit, I am eager to try one of Sunward's more challenging fighter-style kits.

Pros: Distinctive appearance with bat-wing fins.

Cons: Fins snag and break easily.

Overall Rating: 4 out of 5