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Old 03-12-2014, 10:30 PM
Fireman Fireman is offline
Intermediate Rocketeer
 
Join Date: Nov 2013
Posts: 40
Default Alpha 1

These were great fun... I still have one of mine. As I recall, there were several variations, so don't be surprised if the box looks a little different than some of the pictures.

As great as these were, there were a couple of drawbacks. first was the price... what with the fancy packaging and all, they were pretty expensive for those of us who got an allowance of 25 cents a week...

also, the loading system was fiddly in the extreme. It did work as advertised, but having to remove that base piece, pack it with "fuel" and get it re-inserted in the rocket was always a bit frustrating.

But it was a ROCKET! And it really flew! Mighty cool. To this day, I remember the instruction sheat and the list of things you could do with the rocket. One of my favorites was to use it for sending "Rocket Mail!" Petty cool! Even if sending rocket mail really meant writing a note on a piece of paper, taping it to the red plastic rocket body, and firing it in to your next-door neighbor's yard. Silly? Of course. But still loads of fun...

There was a similar rocket on the market about the same time that I liked even more, though. Sold by none other than Dennis the Menace himself, it was called the "Moon-master." It was made of YELLOW plastic, and was both cheaper and simpler to use, while capable of similar performance. The Moonmaster came with "fuel" consisting of a small package of crystalized citric acid and tablets of compressed baking soda. To fire, you poured the citric acid solution up to the fill line in the polythene rocket, added a certain number of fuel tablets (I think it was three...can't remember for sure...) inserted the "launcher" (a hard red plastic plug on a funnel like base, shook the rocket a couple of times, set it down on the sidewalk and ran. The Alpha was command laiunched by pulling the string... There was no such control with the moonmaster. It just took off when the presure reached the right point... If you weren't far enough away, you got showered with nasty vinegar smelling goo. Of course, that could be fun too, but most Moms didn't see it that way.

It would be great to see a pic of the old Moonmaster to go with it's contemporary, the Alpha I.
I still have mine, but it is in storage 1200 miles away in Colorado Springs, so I can't get my hands on it right now for a pic.

Good luck on finding an Alpha I. I have seen a number of them for sale over the years. I don't believe I have ever seen a Moonmaster for sale, but there must still be some out there.

Thanks for bringing back some great memories!

The Fireman,

formerly NAR2217,

Peak City Section #2
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