Originally Posted by tbzep

I wouldn't fool with the foam if it were mine. I have two built Saturns V, an old Centuri Saturn V that your most recent Estes model is based on, and the previous Estes model. The fins on yours will be anchored on the body tube and the plastic fairings will strengthen them considerably. The main body tube doesn't need it either, IMHO. If you were planning to fly it with larger F or G composites, foam might be an option to add some rigidity.

If the fairings were paper, like the previous Estes versions, I might think about foam under them, but I doubt I'd go through with it. The only other area I might consider it on any of the Saturn's is inside the paper transition section. My Centuri Saturn 1B and Saturn V models are over 30 years old and have survived many flights and several moves without foam reinforcement. The 1B did suffer a couple of catos, but foam wouldn't have helped in either case, and would have caused the repairs to be much more difficult.

Originally Posted by tbzep

I wouldn't fool with the foam if it were mine. I have two built Saturns V, an old Centuri Saturn V that your most recent Estes model is based on, and the previous Estes model. The fins on yours will be anchored on the body tube and the plastic fairings will strengthen them considerably. The main body tube doesn't need it either, IMHO. If you were planning to fly it with larger F or G composites, foam might be an option to add some rigidity.

If the fairings were paper, like the previous Estes versions, I might think about foam under them, but I doubt I'd go through with it. The only other area I might consider it on any of the Saturn's is inside the paper transition section. My Centuri Saturn 1B and Saturn V models are over 30 years old and have survived many flights and several moves without foam reinforcement. The 1B did suffer a couple of catos, but foam wouldn't have helped in either case, and would have caused the repairs to be much more difficult.

Originally Posted by DM1975

Thanks for the information. I will go with what you say. I would like to try an F in it sometime, and I do plan on clustering four 18mm motors around the 24mm one in the center.

Originally Posted by dwmzmm

While those plastic F1 nozzles will look good, I'm going to "switch" to using paper F1 nozzles
(made from card stock) so as to not risk distorting and/or melting those plastic ones. I'll
have to look and see where I can find plans for the paper model F1 nozzles (I do know they
exist, as one of our club member has made a larger scale F1 nozzle and showed it to us at
our last club meeting last month; was really cool and super detailed!). The advantage of
using the card stock nozzle is it's more light weight and, should it get damaged during flight,
it's cheaper to build another. Just use the plastic nozzles for display only.

Originally Posted by dwmzmm

Ok, just a quick update:

Here's the card stock model I was talking about, built by our club member David Funk.
Notice the details!! I think these can easily be made to 1/100 scale for the flying scale
Saturn - V's. With a little imagination and work, it shouldn't be all that difficult.