Introduction:
Scale model of the U.S. Army's first guided missile. I got the Aerospace Specialty Products catalog by sending e-mail to them. ASP has some really cool products, especially for NAR people getting into competition. It's a basement business, so don't expect call center answering systems and full blown retail convenience. I bought a couple of Mylar chutes and decided that I'd give one of their kits a try.

It's a good solid kit. Quality BT50 size tube with Kevlar® shock cord anchor, balsa nose cone and basswood fins. It comes with one of their 12" mylar chutes. All in all it's a pretty straight forward and simple kit. I'll let you know how it flies later. I'm sure this is typical of ASP, so I can comfortably recommend them. I will definitely buy more stuff from them in the future.

Quality Scale Kit...
This is a scale model of the US Army's first guided ballistic missile. The Corporal missile was developed about the time and by the same folks who developed the WAC Corporal sounding rocket (hence the name similarity). This kit has a minimum level of detail and no documentation, so you'll have to dig that up yourself. It's a great flying rocket.

Construction:
Construction is pretty straight forward. It use thin basswood for the fins rather than balsa. The conduits on the sides are balsa strips sanded round. The nose cone and payload coupler are balsa. The decals are the peel and stick on type. If you've spent time building paper and wood models, this will be a snap. Otherwise, it makes a great first kit.

I started out wrapping the body tube and payload section with 1/2 oz fiberglass. I also glassed the fins. It resulted in a hard, smooth surface. I then installed the motor mount as per the directions using yellow glue. Here my only objection is a lack of a motor hook. The 18 mm tube is inside a 24 mm tube and the two tubes are flush, so there's no way to apply an external wrap of tape. The only thing holding the motor in is friction. The payload section/nose cone is quite heavy, so this rocket is a good candidate for a drag separation, so you'll want the coupler to fit snug too. Be careful as inexperienced people could have drag separation, or motor ejection.

I attached the fins with thickened epoxy. The reason I used epoxy was I could get a strong bond, but I had some time to work with it. I glued a spent motor onto a scrap piece of cardboard. I placed the body tube on to this. motor such that the fins would just touch the cardboard. I was hoping that I could set the four finned rocket on a flat surface and it wouldn't rock.

I finished all the balsa parts the same way. I applied 2 coats of sanding sealer, sanding with very fine sand paper between coats. Then I mixed some RAKA epoxy with maple flour until it was as thick as very thick syrup. I painted this on the balsa parts. There was no sign of grain after this. I applied a wrap of masking tape to the payload coupler. This isn't really a payload rocket. Payload area is filled with clay.

I applied 2 coats of scratch filling primer, wet sanding between coats with very fine sandpaper. Finally I applied 3 thin coats of Krylon White. When this was done I carefully applied the decals. I'm quite pleased with the results. Won't win any contests, but it looks really nice.

Materials get a 4 (on a scale of 1 to 5). I deduct a half point for the lack of a motor clip and a half point because there is not scale data for the rocket included. If they would include a dimensioned drawing and color drawing, it would be perfect.

Construction Rating: 4 out of 5

Flight/Recovery:
I only recommend the A, B and C motors. It would handle the D motors just fine, but it would go very high, very fast and be hard to track. The C motor gets it way up there. It flies very straight, even in windy conditions. It's fairly heavy for it diameter and fin area, so it doesn't tend to weather cock much.

The supplied parachute is fine, in fact I'm kinda in love with the ASP mylar chutes. I attach a snap swivel from a fishing supply store and use the ASP parachute on all my model rockets. That parachute has been through a lot. Get a red one.

It's a fine flier.

Flight Rating: 5 out of 5

Summary:
This is a very pretty rocket. The value for your money if fantastic. It flies well, high and straight every time. It's large enough that you can just see it a the end of a C6-5 boost. The take off is nice and slow with the A motor.

Overall Rating: 4 out of 5