Semroc Snipe Hunter

[tbzep]

I picked up the Snipe Hunter as a freebie when ordering my Mars Lander kit. This is a neat little kit. I'll most likely use an adapter and fly it on mini motors. I almost built it with a permanent 13mm mount, but decided to leave it in stock configuration.

Assembly was a piece of cake. Parts are excellent. For some reason, I had the black paint craze on me again. This is the second time it has happened in the last year, although I've been using the same paints on other projects without problems. I sanded the black off and repainted with good success.

The only thing that isn't favorable about the kit is the roll pattern decals. The instructions say that they are on white decal paper, but when I applied them over the clear payload section, they were clear and show the balsa underneath. The balsa is also a little tall and protrudes past the decals about 1/8". It would be easy to fix the problem if I built a second kit, but the little bird still looks good, so I'll leave it as it is. I'm not a fan of the baby blue, so I painted the transition section red to match the nosecone.

[A Fish Named Wallyum]

Mine's still flyin' nekkid. ;)

[stefanj]

I bought one too.

Thanks for the heads-up on the decals. I will trim down the shoulders and paint the ends of the payload tube white.

[Vanel]

Had the same problem with the black paint crazing :p Here's a pic of mine:
http://billcooke.org/images/Fleet/Snipe_Hunter.jpg

[tbzep]

Bill,

Your roll pattern decals look white in the pic. Were they clear like mine?

Stefan,

It might save save you some trouble if you clip some of the excess off your roll pattern sheet and stick it in some water to see if the material is clear or white. You will still need to trim the ends of the nosecone and transition, though.

[dwmzmm]

Nice picture; is that an episode of Star Trek on the TV screen in the back (Chekov)?!

[tbzep]

Yep. There was a ST marathon yesterday on G4. :D

[dtomko]

I spotted the Trek on the tube too!

My decals for the roll patterns had white backgrounds, even the one for the lower BT.

What kind of black paint are you guys using? I brush painted this with a 7 year old bottle of Tamiya acrylic black. Went on beautifully. I am using acrylics more and more. I've burned out enough brain cells for one lifetime :(

Drew

[EchoVictor]

Funny how we all notice things in the background on these photos instead...

The first thing I caught was the Outlander packaging. Is that a set of Estes EAC Viper instructions I see on top of it?

Later,
EV

[Vanel]

Bill,

Your roll pattern decals look white in the pic. Were they clear like mine?

Nope. Mine were white, thank goodness.

[dwmzmm]

Funny how we all notice things in the background on these photos instead...

The first thing I caught was the Outlander packaging. Is that a set of Estes EAC Viper instructions I see on top of it?

Later,
EV

The other thing that caught my eye was the layout of the workbench...looks a lot like mine
(things are a bit scattered about...).

But the Snipe Hunter looks really super. I can recall when I first looked at the Centuri catalog in 1969 how cool that model looked (hell, almost all the models in the catalog were
cool!!). Those models with the clear payload sections were always fun. I still have my Estes
vintage Astron Farside (still in the bag) awaiting assembly, and that, my dear friends, also
has a payload section (can't remember if it's clear; I'll go check it out after I post this).

[dwmzmm]

The other thing that caught my eye was the layout of the workbench...looks a lot like mine
(things are a bit scattered about...).

But the Snipe Hunter looks really super. I can recall when I first looked at the Centuri catalog in 1969 how cool that model looked (hell, almost all the models in the catalog were
cool!!). Those models with the clear payload sections were always fun. I still have my Estes
vintage Astron Farside (still in the bag) awaiting assembly, and that, my dear friends, also
has a payload section (can't remember if it's clear; I'll go check it out after I post this).

Just checked, yes, the Astron Farside does have a clear payload section too!

[tbzep]

Funny how we all notice things in the background on these photos instead...

The first thing I caught was the Outlander packaging. Is that a set of Estes EAC Viper instructions I see on top of it?

Later,
EV

Yes... I have a half finished Outlander and a completed EAC Viper on the table. There's a Semroc Mars Lander in the box. The Viper has it's base coat of white, but I haven't gotten around to painting the purple and yellow yet. I also have some more plans buried under the stuff that I intend to clone this summer.

[ghrocketman]

The farside kit is an original, not a clone correct ?
A clear payload section on an Original Astron Farside kit is an oddity.
Any idea when the kit was produced ? Maybe this happened very early or very late in the life of this particular kit offering.
In all catalog shots of the Farside or Farside X, the payload is most certainly NOT clear.
The kit I have as well as all I have seen use a plain section of BT-50 for the payload (the farside X used BT60).

[dwmzmm]

The farside kit is an original, not a clone correct ?
A clear payload section on an Original Astron Farside kit is an oddity.
Any idea when the kit was produced ? Maybe this happened very early or very late in the life of this particular kit offering.
In all catalog shots of the Farside or Farside X, the payload is most certainly NOT clear.
The kit I have as well as all I have seen use a plain section of BT-50 for the payload (the farside X used BT60).

My mistake; just checked the kit in the bag itself and saw the payload section is a standard
BT-50 bodytube (when I made the previous post, I simply checked the on line catalogs in
the Ninfinger website, who's pics of the Astron Farside's payload section appears clear).

My Astron Farside is an original, the package seal header has the Damon/Estes logo as does
the instruction sheets.

On a related note, there was a message thread on The Rocketry Forum a while back with the
topic being what is the highest flying Estes kit, and my answer was...the Astron Farside! I think the starter of that thread meant Estes kits using standard Estes 18 mm and 24 mm
motors.