
(Contributed - by David Fergus)
Brief:
Exotic re-issue of the original Estes Trident, but with only two BT-20 ejection
gas porting tubes instead of three BT-5 porting tubes.
Construction:
Kit comes with:
- (7) balsa nose cones
- (4) balsa fins
- original rubber shock cord and
- BT-50 engine pod and parachute
- BT-20 ejection gas porting tubes
- 18mm engine mount
- excellent decal set; all of excellent quality.
I found this kit at a hobby
shop that tries hard to pay attention and take advantage of Estes sales to
vendors of OOP kits, presumably that are sitting on their shelf. Instructions
were easy to follow. The key to making this a better model than the original
Trident is to make sure the ejection gas can freely flow from the engine pod to
the parachute pod. Estes did this by using BT-20 instead of BT-5 tubes. Another
feature is to provide cardstock frames that are glued around each porting slot
on the tubes and then glued to each other. The reason my original Trident
failed when I was a lad was probably glue closing off one or more of these
ports enough so that the ejection gas blew off one of my ejection tubes with
the rocket coming down in pieces with no parachute; which was pretty
discouraging to a 12-year old. Anyway, the rocket is solid and has healthier
gas flow paths than my original Trident had.
Finishing:
The instructions called for a gloss pearl gray. It took a lot of coats to get
enough paint in the crevices between the tubes. Decals are water transfer which
look good on top of pearl gray.
Construction Rating:
5
out of 5
Flight:
The recommended motors were B and C. I used B4-4, C6-5, and C6-3; with C6-3
being the best flight. I still used wadding, but enough should be used to make
sure that acceleration doesn't jam down under the ejection ports in the
parachute bay and remove itself from effectiveness. The rocket flew nice and
straight all three times.
Recovery:
I had not used the rubber shockcord but had replaces with a longer elastic
cord. An 18 inch chute was a little much and a 12 inch chute not quite enough
for this rocket.
Flight Rating:
5
out of 5
Summary:
PRO: good ejection as porting to ensure a long lasting multiple flight rocket.
CON: none
Overall Rating:
5
out of 5