Brief:
Single stage rocket capable of exceeding the speed of sound on 24 mm F & G motors.

Construction:
The overall quality of the kit was excellent. The instructions were clear and easy to understand (there are also further instructions on the rocketvision website if you need them) Very little preparation of parts was required - sanding to round the leading / trailing edges of the fins and to make them fit the pre cut fin slots. Once assembled the rocket has a very solid feel - almost unbreakable !

Finishing:
Finishing was very easy with the materials used. I gave the whole thing a light sand - applied a couple of coats of grey primer and then a red gloss top coat for a very smooth looking rocket. I was a little disappointed with the quality of the decals there were little blemishes in the printing which spoiled them a bit.

Construction Rating: 4 out of 5

Flight:
I was a little apprehensive about flying this rocket having heard so many tails of people losing them on the first flight. To give myself the best chance of recovering it I chose Estes D12-7 motors for the first few flights. The recovery system using a Nomex cloth as permanent wadding so there's no messing with little squares of paper. Motor retention is by friction fit (you also need to make a thrust ring with tape at the rear of the motor) The first flight was near perfect - a straight boost up to about 1200 feet. Parachute deployment near apogee. The 10 inch chute supplied with this model makes for a fairly quick descent (with minimal drift). Landed about 15 - 20 feet from the pad.

I made two further flights on D12-7's with almost identical results. I then headed for the table where a local hobby shop had set up for the day to try and find something with a little more kick to launch it with. The biggest 24mm motor I could find was an Aerotech E30-7T so in it went and onto the pad. 5 ... 4 ... 3... 2... 1... and off it went - I think I saw about the first 10 feet of flight before it screamed out of sight. Looking anxiously around and waiting ..... POP as the ejection charge fired - fortunately the loud ejection made it possible to locate the rocket in the sky again .. very high up ... after a seemingly endless wait the rocket touched down about 100 ft from the pad. Running the rocket / engine combination through WRasp showed apogee at over 3000 feet and a max velocity of nearly 600mph. I would strongly recommend choosing a motor which leaves fairly dense smoke behind - the blue thunder in the E30-7 leaves almost none making it very hard to track the fast moving rocket.

I added an extra 1/2 ounce of weight to the inside front of the nose cone - this was recommended by RocketVision to increase stability of the rocket at low speed. Apparently some Estes D engines have shown uneven thrust early in the burn which can cause stability problems with the Mach Buster.

Recovery:
The recovery system uses a Kevlar shock cord - a 10 inch nylon parachute and a Nomex cloth to protect the parachute. On all four flights in performed perfectly, returning the rocket to earth quickly but safely with minimal drift. There was some sign of wear to the shock cord after four flights but no real signs that it will break in the near future.

Flight Rating: 5 out of 5

Summary:
By far the best feature of this rocket is the solid construction - I suspect the rocket would survive even if the parachute failed. The main Con would have to be the difficulty in tracking the flight of the rocket - it's very small and extremely quick - sure gets peoples attention at club launches.

Overall Rating: 4 out of 5