I'm quite happy about the thread drift! I had forgotten the name Oracover, which I'd first come across in the late 1970s or early 1980s. Reading about the various coverings, I was reminded of the "old school" method of covering body tubes with model airplane tissue, which was shrunk smooth by applying butyrate dope or nitrate dope. Looking up the self-adhesive Ultracote Trim online, I was glad to see that it comes in numerous colors, which would be great for rockets as well. The heat-shrunk Monokote might also be a good body tube covering.

__________________
Black Shire--Draft horse in human form, model rocketeer, occasional mystic, and writer, see:
http://www.lulu.com/content/paperba...an-form/8075185
http://www.lulu.com/product/cd/what...of-2%29/6122050
http://www.lulu.com/product/cd/what...of-2%29/6126511
All of my book proceeds go to the Northcote Heavy Horse Centre www.northcotehorses.com.
NAR #54895 SR

I think it is a lot easier to work with than MonoKote. Evidently MonoKote thought so too because they eventually came out with their own low temperature covering. I don't know if it is as stiff as MonoKote or more like Ultracote.

Talk of covering makes me think about a tangent of the steam punk theme. Use centering rings externally on the BT. Make rib and spar fins and nose cone, or just use regular fins with wood strips on them and a solid cone, then cover it all with Silkspan to simulate a fabric covered airplane.

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I love sanding.

Great idea!

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Jeffrey Deem
NAR16741
CIA section 527

Hmmm...that could be used to make rigid airship flying models (physicist Bill Bigge made a small rubber-powered indoor-flying one that way [I don't know what type of plastic covering he used]; it was featured in a 1971 issue of the A.M.A.'s magazine "American Aircraft Modeler." Also, boost-gliders could use Monokote-covered, spar-and-ribs wings--a Falcon or Swift made that way would not only look "WWI," but would probably glide longer than their solid balsa-winged versions!

__________________
Black Shire--Draft horse in human form, model rocketeer, occasional mystic, and writer, see:
http://www.lulu.com/content/paperba...an-form/8075185
http://www.lulu.com/product/cd/what...of-2%29/6122050
http://www.lulu.com/product/cd/what...of-2%29/6126511
All of my book proceeds go to the Northcote Heavy Horse Centre www.northcotehorses.com.
NAR #54895 SR

Silkspan is different from Monokote.

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I love sanding.

I know that the "-kote" and "-cote" coverings are plastic. Is silkspan actual fabric, or is it model airplane tissue that looks like fabric when it's applied to a model's framework? (I've seen larger model airplanes that were covered with actual fabric, doped taut just like on full-scale fabric-covered airplanes.) Also:

Bill Bigge's rubber-powered rigid airship model (it wasn't a scale model, but it rather resembled the ZR-3 U.S.S. Los Angeles [formerly the LZ-126, before her delivery from Germany]) didn't have individual internal gas cells like a full-scale Zeppelin. Instead, its plastic covering was applied over its balsa strip framework with slightly overlapping seams, so that the entire hull was gas-tight (not needing internal pressure like a blimp, the seams didn't have to be extremely strong).

__________________
Black Shire--Draft horse in human form, model rocketeer, occasional mystic, and writer, see:
http://www.lulu.com/content/paperba...an-form/8075185
http://www.lulu.com/product/cd/what...of-2%29/6122050
http://www.lulu.com/product/cd/what...of-2%29/6126511
All of my book proceeds go to the Northcote Heavy Horse Centre www.northcotehorses.com.
NAR #54895 SR