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joecool
09-18-2008, 10:41 AM
OK, I know I'm going out on a limb here, but would any of you old timers be willing to share some secrets with a newbie? So far I've just been getting the OOP kits off ebay, but they can be expensive and selection is pretty limited. Where do folks go to find the old stuff?

Phred
09-18-2008, 10:50 AM
Older kits can be harder and harder to find these days.

Ebay is the best, for selection, but prices are higher.

I search every hobby shop and toy store whenever I travel. Sometimes I can find OOP kits, but I haven't ever found anything any earlier than the 1980s

garage sales/estate sales. Yes, kits can be found in these places, but you can go to 100 garage sales and find nothing.... On the other hand, my Mom picked up a vintage built up Interceptor for me at a garage sale for $3.00!! I flew it at NARAM50.

old club members: I do not mean age. I have been able to get vintage kits from rocketeers who had quit or retired from rocketry. The prices are usually reasonable, if the owner is looking to just ditch what they have.

Phred

sandman
09-18-2008, 11:01 AM
OK, I know I'm going out on a limb here, but would any of you old timers be willing to share some secrets with a newbie? So far I've just been getting the OOP kits off ebay, but they can be expensive and selection is pretty limited. Where do folks go to find the old stuff?

OK, let's begin.

First let me introduce you to what may be a new model rocket term for you. It's called cloning. I know it's a dumb term but what it means is to copy or reproduce an old kit.

Now go to JimZ's web site.

http://www.dars.org/jimz/estes.htm

or YORP (Ye Olde Rocket Plans)

http://plans.rocketshoppe.com/

figure out what you want to reproduce.

Then go to SEMROC

http://www.semroc.com

They may even have a new version of the kit you want or look around on SEMROC's site and find the parts you want.

That should keep you busy for a while. Then come back here and ask more questions...you WILL have more questions.

Oh, and be sure to post pictures of what you're building...every step, don't leave anything out!

It's just a beginning.

sandman
09-18-2008, 11:13 AM
Oh, I forgot to mention.

I make custom nosecones for upscales, and downscales of some of the old kits as well as scale stuff.

Fred, the guy who posted first also make the decals. His site is

http://excelsiorrocketry.com/

Just visit his site and see what decals he offers.

joecool
09-18-2008, 11:26 AM
thanks, guys, i'm sure cloning is something i will be trying in the future (it's called kit bashing too right?). however i have this funny sort of perfectionist/obsessive collector streak and i really prefer the idea of owning the original kit. THEN i may kit bash it and have the best of both worlds! :D

Mikus
09-18-2008, 11:50 AM
Fred, the guy who posted first also make the decals. His site is

http://excelsiorrocketry.com/

Just visit his site and see what decals he offers.

A top-notch vendor, I've used him several times. Excellent. :cool:

joecool
09-18-2008, 12:03 PM
hey, do you know what he is offering for the goonybirds? i'd love to have the kits but at $6 a pop i'm guessing that's not it. is it just the decals and/or plans? if so, where do you get the materials to do the build?

sandman
09-18-2008, 12:17 PM
hey, do you know what he is offering for the goonybirds? i'd love to have the kits but at $6 a pop i'm guessing that's not it. is it just the decals and/or plans? if so, where do you get the materials to do the build?

The $6 includes the plans.

As for a source.

SEMROC as mentioned above

BMS is another good source

http://www.balsamachining.com/

as well as Apogee components

http://www.apogeerockets.com/

Mark II
09-18-2008, 12:59 PM
Sandman is right about cloning; what he described is truly just the beginning. :D

During the time that I have been a BAR I have been busily cloning my way through the 33-34 years that I missed after I put my model rocket hobby interest "up on the shelf for a little while." For me, this is not a nostalgia trip, because I never saw most of these rockets the first time they came around! Right now is a really good time to be into cloning, too, because there are now many more suppliers of original or reproduction parts or kits than there were even a few years ago, and communicating and sharing information with veteran rocket fliers about their experiences with those designs is so easy now.

In light of the particulars about your interest, I would like to mention that there is cloning, and then there is cloning. :D The thing that most of us usually call "cloning" could also be called "building reproductions." (And this is actually closer to the true meaning of the term.) But there is another way of building those designs that doesn't necessarily involve breaking open and building mint-condition vintage kits. You can build one of the old designs up by using OEM parts from the same era as the kit, and you end up with an authentically vintage model rocket. So don't restrict your search to just complete or nearly complete vintage kits; also look for same-era parts, as well. And kit-bashing, as you mentioned, is another good way to go, too.

Mark \\.

joecool
09-18-2008, 01:27 PM
ok, so what is the difference between kit bashing and cloning? i thought they were the same .... :confused:

Rocketflyer
09-18-2008, 01:41 PM
ok, so what is the difference between kit bashing and cloning? i thought they were the same .... :confused:

Briefly, cloning is making the same rocket, but out of availabe parts, to be as true to the original as possible. Kitbashing is making one rocket (kit) to resemble another, such as a Bullpup to look like an MMX missile.

Hope this helps.

Phred
09-18-2008, 01:47 PM
Strictly speaking: kitbashing is when you take a kit, and modify ('bash') it into another model (like turning a Baby Bertha into a Goonybird).

Cloning is when you collect parts and build a model from scratch, to be just like an OOP model.

Phred

joecool
09-18-2008, 01:57 PM
got it. thanks guys! don't want to look stupid at the next club launch!

barone
09-18-2008, 03:13 PM
And.....if you're looking for something in particular, you can always got to the "Wanted Dead or Alive" section of the forum and ask if anyone has the kit. Then work out a deal. We have a tendacy to part with things here cheaper than we would on E-Bay because we know they are going to a good home.... :D

joecool
09-18-2008, 03:17 PM
yeah, i REALLY want the Estes Silver Comet and posted for it already. Fingers crossed ... !

scigs30
09-18-2008, 04:02 PM
I would think the difference between cloning and kit bashing would be the use of authentic OEM parts. Cloning a Gooneybird would be using a Semroc balsa nose cone vs kit bashing and using an original Estes plastic nose cone. I think cloning is much easier and less expensive than trying to kit bash. As a matter of fact Semroc has some of the Goonies all ready. I am currently only building original old Estes kits and it is real expensive to purchase these kits. I have found some great bargains at garage sales and thrift shops. I will admit even though these kits go for 30 to 125.00 dollars, it is still cheaper than a lot of other hobbies. You can also try this website, a little expensive but great service. http://www.modelrockets.co.uk/shop/product_info.php?products_id=1585

Solomoriah
09-18-2008, 04:27 PM
A clone can be kit-bashed, but a kit bash doesn't have to be a clone.

Several of my "original" rockets were kitbashed.

Royatl
09-18-2008, 04:52 PM
No, Kit-bashing is totally opposite from cloning.

Kit-bashing is taking a kit and making a totally different rocket out of it. The resulting rocket does not have to be something that previously existed, and you may add additional parts (though you may get less respect for it!)

For example:

Phred's Goonys are kit bashes, usually of Baby Bertha kits.
A few people made Canadian Arrows out of Estes 2.6" V-2's and Silver Comets well before Estes came out with their own.
Estes themselves have kit bashed at times. The SPEV is essentially a double kit bash (of a Little Joe II and a Thor Agena B with one extra part), and the Firecat (an EAC offering of the late 70's) was a kit-bash (with maybe an extra part) of an Estes/Vashon Honest John.
SoAR club member Sam Boden made a great kit bash of an Estes Rubicon, that he called the "Saturn Wanna-Be" (http://www.soarrocketry.org/Multimedia/SoARAugust2006Launch/target1.html )



Cloning is taking parts from various sources (possibly including existing kits) and making a rocket that previously existed (and may still). The clone can be an upscale or downscale of the original.

Doug Sams
09-18-2008, 04:54 PM
I would think the difference between cloning and kit bashing would be the use of authentic OEM parts. Cloning a Gooneybird would be using a Semroc balsa nose cone vs kit bashing and using an original Estes plastic nose cone. I think cloning is much easier and less expensive than trying to kit bash. The key, I think, is recognizing that kit-bashing is usually one form of cloning.

Part of the problem is the multiple meanings of many rocketry terms. "Scratch" may refer to how the materials for a clone were sourced, or it may refer to the origin of a design.

In the case of kit bashing, you might build a clone by 1) assembling it from scratch, 2) using a clone kit, or 3) bashing an existing kit into the clone.

As stated elsewhere, bashing isn't limited to building clones. A kit may be bashed into an original design as well. Where I've heard it used is often in the context of scale rockets. A Comet or Canadian Arrow can be bashed into a V-2.

In my case, perhaps incorrectly, I sometimes use the term bash to refer to making modifications to a kit. I'll add vent holes and modify booster stagers for gap staging or to improve recovery, as well as other changes to improve the performance or ruggedization of a kit, and call it bashing.

Anyway, because there are multiple interpratations of the terms, it's not always perfectly clear what's meant :)

Doug

.

joecool
09-18-2008, 04:55 PM
royatl's explanation makes more sense to me. if you BASH a kit you are changing (bashing) it. if you CLONE you are making an exact copy, most likely with non-original parts (otherwise you'd wouldn't clone, you just make the original!)

Mark II
09-18-2008, 09:30 PM
Semroc's term "Retro-Repro" is by far the most precise description of what most of us on the forums refer to as a "clone." That is, it is a "Repro"(duction) of a "Retro" (vintage) kit (or design). It is a copy of a vintage design, using reproductions of original parts. Most of Semroc's vast catalogue of parts, and Excelsior's "Classic Waterslide Decals" collection are very accurate copies of components used in vintage kits. You can build a very accurate copy of a vintage model rocket using components from these two sources, but neither of them are original manufacturers of those parts (except that Semroc also has new versions of the parts that they used in their own kits back in the late '60's.) This is by far the most common method used to clone an old design.

Doug has accurately described various meanings of the term "kit-bashing." But when I mentioned the term in my earlier post, I was talking about acquiring various old kits, mostly incomplete ones, in order to harvest their parts. A person would keep doing this until he or she has enough OEM parts from the correct era to build a version of a rocket from that era that is truly vintage, through and through. The result could also be called a "clone," because it was built from a collection of parts, and not from an original, complete kit. It could also be said to have been "kit-bashed," for obvious reasons. Their have been some in the past who asserted that this was the only "true" form of cloning, but I think that they had it backwards. What I just described above is a true form (but not necessarily the only true form) of kit-bashing. The process that I described in the first part of this post, on the other hand, is pure cloning.

There is one other thing that I wanted to say about this kind of kit-bashing: it can often be much more cost-effective, and much less emotionally and ethically distressing, way to build a truly vintage rocket. The usual way to do this is, of course, to obtain a vintage kit and build it. But as you have noticed, vintage kits, when thay can even be found, can be quite pricey, because in many cases, they have become rare collectibles. There have been VERY EXTENSIVE discussions in the past on this forum and in other places about the ethics or desirablility of opening and building vintage kits, including some that might be quite rare. (PLEASE NOTE: I do NOT want to reignite this debate here!!) If you search for some of these threads, you will find that opinions in the rocketry community about this subject are absolutely all over the map. There is a significant number of rocket builders, though, who believe that one should preserve very old, unopened kits whenever possible, and simply clone the designs instead using reproduction parts. But if you like the idea of building an old rocket that is completely vintage all the way through, then obtaining your parts on eBay from incomplete kits or parts assortments from the relevant era can be a way to avoid this dilemma.

Mark \\.