Sheri's Hot Rockets, LJII QTV
 

Group,

I understand that there is a discussion about this kit, but no build pictures?! I am in the process of buiding one and I will post pictures later this evening.

I only have 3 of her kits (SHR), and the LJII is taxing all of my building abilities to get right.

Unfortunately, I have had to almost throw out the included instructions and make my own set, and replace/enhance many of the kit components. I don't know if others have had this same experience, but from what I have read, its a common experience with other builders.

All I can say is, 'Thank God we have styrene sheets to work with!'


The nose cone, I would have paid an extra $40 - $60 to have either a solid wood, or blow molded plastic example.

The fins made of styrene, while quick to build, are very unscale, and fragile.

The main body tube ... that had to go as well; actually I found a way to work around it.

The dummy LES ... I kept the tower assembly and part of the main LES tube (DOWEL) structure.

The kit is GREAT if you want just a sport scale to fly for fun, still a pain to build. I have her Sat 1b that I don't think I will ever build, but use it as a 1/48 reference model to scratch build a near-scale 1b. To be honest, I was a little disappointed with the Lox and Fuel tanks not being individual tubes but an accordion arragement that approximated the look of 8 seperate tubes. Nice in size, but once you get within 1 yard of it, you start to see issues ... not goot at all!

I will get some pics up later tonight ... in the meantime, please enjoy this first picture of the main body and nose cone that I finished; not per the instructions in the kit:



Jonathan

P.s. I hope this helps ease some of the tensions caused by my political postings. After all, I do build fly and rockets RIGHT along side my left-winged brothers. :)

HA!! Good one, Jonathon!

S.

The more I hear and see of her kits the more I think they are hideous piles of canine fecal matter that are not a good value at even HALF the asking price !
I SURE am glad I was never lured into purchasing one of the heaps.
That 1/48th Saturn 1B may be the worst joke of them all but is the ONLY 1/48th scale S1B supposed kit I know of.
Several (Sirius, Apogee, Polecat) Saturn V's are larger than the typical 1/100 kit, but there are no DECENT Saturn 1B kits larger than the 1/70th offerings by Apogee and Semroc.

ANY Saturn 1B kit that does NOT have individual full-round booster tanks is a HASHI-MOTO MESS in my book !

Rocketman,

There is noting wrong with her kits if you are just building and flying for fun. They are a great low-cost way to start building/flying medium power kits. I am just being hyper-critical as I am build for scale.

If I wanted a fun rocket, and I wanted a Mercury-Atlas, Gemini-Titan or Space Shuttle, I would buy, build and fly her kits.

Nothing wrong with what Chris and Sheri produced. And frankly, we need more garage manufactures, IMHO!

Take that Delta IV Heavy Lift model. There are short comings with that kit also... but again I am looking for scale. Great kits all around. Are they for the beginner? No no and NO! Are they for the first time Medium power flier ... no no and NO! Are they for people who have experience building high power, with a little R/C plane and plastic kit experience ... yes yes and YES! The Delta IV will be built for Next season. Not sure if I will enter it in internats or just use it for NAR competition. Love that slow roll program in the video ... EXTREMELY realistic!

I think on the 1b, weight would have been the issue that would have moved the rocket from mid-power into high power. High Power is dificult to fly: costs, finding a flying field and possible waivers. Medium power can be done out of a small park and sometimes without any hassle; sometimes. It was likely a financial desicision by SHR to cut corners, keep the weight down, and hopefully sell more rockets due to their, 'usibility'.

E.G., I wanted to build a cosmodrone Soyuez R-7, but it would have been way too heavy and reguired an H ... NAR won't allow it in competition :(

Now as for Sheri herself, she is HOT and will always be no matter what the status of her relationships with the customer ... kinda like a Black Widow spider and her male consort ... poor guy is going to die, but have fun in the process!!! :p


Jonathan

You do realize that Sheri no longer owns CJS models?

Dave at Red Arrow Hobbies bought it about a month or so ago.

He is changing the kits a bit but that may take a while.

Yes as I read all the najor forums. She and Chris started SHR ... I was hoping to see their 'NAZI-Saucer' in kit form. I would have just built it for static display.

OH, one thing that comes to mind about the 1b ... the resin LES ... not going to use that either ... instead, I secured a couple of Revell 1/48 Scale Apollo Spacecraft models (partially built/incomplete kits) that will go on top. Just have to fix the blast cover issue ... not an issue at all because we have STYRENE!!! :chuckle:

Jonathan

Not sure I would have done what Sheri did.

She cast her capsule from the Revell kit!


I have made patterns for the Apollo capsule for several scales so let me know if you need anything.

Dave told me (and several other folks) that he had to redo most of the molds. and asked for input on the instructions ect. And he will incorperate the input on the 2nd run.
Mr. Bob
Starlight Dude

I posted a few of mine here ...

http://www.oldrocketforum.com/showt...&highlight=ljii

Attached are a couple more.

FWIW, the corrugated wrap provided with this kit is about an inch short of true scale ... I had to cut down the upper part of the LJII airframe an inch to keep the proportions correct. Naturally, I didn't figure this out until after I had the wrap installed and stood around thinking "that just doesn't look right." I should have measured it before putting it on, of course -- another lesson learned. But I'm not sure what I would have done about it other than scratch-build the corrugations, and having done the fins, tower, CM, and decals with non-kit parts I'm pretty close to a scratch-build already. Some of that is due to my own changes (as I note in the aforementioned thread I opted to model the A-001 round instead of the QTV) but Jonathan is correct: this is really a semi-scale "fly for fun" kit.

3602s ... LJII sporting a fresh coat of polished aluminum Alclad
2920s ... The LES attached to the CM
2921s ... Applying the first of the decals

What I'd really like is an injection-molded LES tower in 1:48 scale so I don't have to build another from scratch when I do my some-day Saturn V ... :) I keep watching those Revell kits come and go on eBay, but they're a bit pricey. Maybe Revell will re-release it some day ... I keep hoping.