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Old 02-19-2007, 12:18 PM
SaturnV SaturnV is offline
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Default Citation / Cobra rocketry question

Anybody remember the Citation line of rockets that was brought out by Estes (I think). What was the deal with that? Was it supposed to be a different line of rockets? I remember my brother and I bought some Citation marked engines probably back in the mid to late 70's . The first one we tried literally blew up the rocket on the pad. Stunned, we loaded another rocket and had the same result. We wound up poking a hole in the ground and would stick the engine , nozzle up, in the hole, and ignite it to see what would happen. If I recall only 1 fired as it should, the rest blew up. We were kind of broke back then so we probably only bought a couple of packs of engines, so i am assuming 1 out of the 6 worked, at a cost of 2 destroyed rockets. Anyway I was wondering what that citation name was about. Was it Estes or some other company?? In the same vein, I just bought some Estes mini engines that are marked Estes Cobra. What is up with all these different names of Estes products.
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Old 02-19-2007, 12:42 PM
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Rocketking Rocketking is offline
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Default An Attempt at 'marketing'...

As I recall, the Citation kits were all boxed. No explanation (that I recall) was ever given, but this was more of the same 'flash' style marketing that 'E' has tried and failed at since Vern left the fold. I can't speak for the engines, never having used them.

Estes keeps trying to do things diferent, and keeps falling in the same holes... 'E2X' and 'Cobra' means NOTHING if the product dependability isn't there.

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Old 02-19-2007, 01:09 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by SaturnV
Anybody remember the Citation line of rockets that was brought out by Estes (I think). What was the deal with that?


I think we had a similar discussion either here or over on OldRockets some time back, and the consensus was this was an early Estes' attempt to break into the large retail department store market. Back in the late 1960's and into the early 1970's, you had Sears, Montgomery Ward, J. C. Penny's, and National Bellas Hess covering the country, with Kress eventually becomming K-Mart. The opportunity for reaching the mass market was there for the taking. Estes was trying to make the product more "consumer friendly".

Quote:
In the same vein, I just bought some Estes mini engines that are marked Estes Cobra. What is up with all these different names of Estes products.


Probably more of an attempt to "spice up" the product line with gimmickery, rather than with substance, to boost sales. This is Estes' biggest weakness. Those motors were all pressed on the same machines as the ones before, and the ones that have come afterward...
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Old 02-19-2007, 02:42 PM
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I agree. But remember, this was not just plain old ESTES. ESTES was now owned by the DAMON corp, and was looking for bigger sales. I always believed that the CITATION LINE was the DAMON/ESTES first attempt to broaden model rocketry by making it 'POP'. Not only were Citation items boxed in order to fit on Toy/Hobby dept shelves, the motor numbering was simplified, and wild 'POP' decals were added. Parts were chromed, plastic nosecones were molded in color and needed no painting. In earliest versions, the motors came with not only the starter sets, but also with the model kits themselves.

I guess this did not succeed, as I never saw boxed Citation kits 'back in the old days'.

Motor were labelled 'COBRA' in the 1990s for the same reason rockets were labeled 'ASTRON' in the 1960s: to provide some sort of marketable name. Perhaps this was in response to QUEST's appearence in the early 1990s.

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Old 02-19-2007, 02:45 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by excelsior_rocketry
In earliest versions, the motors came with not only the starter sets, but also with the model kits themselves.

Hmmm. I didn't know motors came with the original Citation kits. I have the motors in my original Citation Quasar Starter Set.
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Old 02-19-2007, 02:53 PM
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Oh yeah... and Citation kits, in the original box, go for some BIG bucks vs the same lit, but bagged!!

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Old 02-19-2007, 02:58 PM
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Most boxed Ciatation kits have a sticker over the side panel that says the motors are included. I have a boxed, copper colored plastic nosed BOMARC without the sticker, WITH the motors!

Ph





Quote:
Originally Posted by excelsior_rocketry
In earliest versions, the motors came with not only the starter sets, but also with the model kits themselves.


Hmmm. I didn't know motors came with the original Citation kits. I have the motors in my original Citation Quasar Starter Set.
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Old 02-19-2007, 03:04 PM
Ltvscout Ltvscout is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by excelsior_rocketry
Most boxed Ciatation kits have a sticker over the side panel that says the motors are included. I have a boxed, copper colored plastic nosed BOMARC without the sticker, WITH the motors!

Ah, so that's what that sticker is for!

I'll give ya $20 for that Bomarc.
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Old 02-19-2007, 03:21 PM
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: - )

I am mostly a builder, not a collector. I collect only a few things: Goonys (of course), Citation kits and accessories, vintage motors, and Canaroc stuff.

I am so loony that I have collected both the copper colored vacu-form noseconed boxed Citation Bomarc, and the not much later hollow balsa noseconed boxed Citation Bomarc....


My wife would kill me if she found out whjat I paid for them....

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Old 02-19-2007, 06:06 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by SaturnV
Anybody remember the Citation line of rockets that was brought out by Estes (I think). What was the deal with that? Was it supposed to be a different line of rockets? I remember my brother and I bought some Citation marked engines probably back in the mid to late 70's . The first one we tried literally blew up the rocket on the pad. Stunned, we loaded another rocket and had the same result. We wound up poking a hole in the ground and would stick the engine , nozzle up, in the hole, and ignite it to see what would happen. If I recall only 1 fired as it should, the rest blew up. We were kind of broke back then so we probably only bought a couple of packs of engines, so i am assuming 1 out of the 6 worked, at a cost of 2 destroyed rockets. Anyway I was wondering what that citation name was about. Was it Estes or some other company?? In the same vein, I just bought some Estes mini engines that are marked Estes Cobra. What is up with all these different names of Estes products.



Citation was indeed a separate line of rockets intended to be sold in department stores. Estes was getting some pressure from new market entrant MPC who sold boxed kits into the same stores that sold their plastic model kits. It was only natural that Estes would want to get into those same stores, and those stores would not put up with bagged kits. So a separate line was created. The rockets in the line were generally more colorful than previous Estes models, and the engine codes were simplified for the presumably less sophisticated department store customer.

http://www.ninfinger.org/~sven/rock...1/71citcat.html

It should be noted that MPC also introduced blister pack packaging to rocketry, which Estes eventually went to many years later. Before that, Estes' retail packaging for their motor was the same ol' blue mailing tube we got in our mail boxes. They eventually switched to the "diamond" tube, that was slightly more retailer-friendly (Retail Centuri motors, and the Estes Citation motors, were sold in boxes).

You probably got some motors that had been thermal-cycled. We didn't understand that phenomena fully back then.

As to 'Cobra,' yes, that was Estes' new management at the time (early 90's) trying to hitch onto the testosterone ride that was the big R/C car scene. One thing you should understand is that Barry Tunick (who became the manager of Estes back then, and owns the company now) was a big-wig at Hasbro, and brought a lot of those marketing tendencies into Estes.
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