When I received the Kappa 9m it was the first ASP product I had ever seen so I really didn't know what to expect. I opened the simple plastic bag type packaging and immediately was amazed at the quality of the parts used in the kit. The nose cone and transition section are balsa, one thing I haven't seen in a good long while since most manufacturers prefer plastics nowadays, and the fin stock, to my pleasant surprise, was basswood. The instructions were clear and concise. The instructions were clear and concise. They almost took the fun out of building the kit because they we so precise and well worded that it would have been impossible for even the 1st time rocket kit builder to make any mistakes.

I built the kit according to the instructions and finished the rocket in Aluminum, Red, and Black (the instructions called for the black areas to be steel but I had no steel paint left). Then I placed the decal according to directions, which comes to my only complaint about the kit. The decal was a self stick and didn't seem to have enough sticking strength, so what I decided to do is to apply a very light, almost dry-brushed coat of CA on the backing of the decal and it worked fine.

I have been able to fly the Kappa 9M once since it was completed due to horrible weather conditions here (wind, rain, snow, and other garbage).  I took it out to the backyard on an overcast but pretty calm day and set it on the pad with an Estes C6-7, packed it with the recommended wadding and then carefully packed the 12" mylar chute. The Kappa went up straight as an arrow and deployed perfectly upon apogee. The decent was nice and easy with a bit of drift but I would figure I had to walk no more than 100 yards to recover the rocket.

On a scale of 1 to 5 I would give this kit a 5 in every category you could think of. The materials, workmanship, flight and recovery of this rocket are just great.

UPDATE 5/99:
It has been about 6 months since I wrote this review and the Kappa has gone up about 25 times now and what can I say but that it is getting to the point that every time I pull the rocket off the shelf I know it is ready to fly. I have used A,B,C, even the higher power 18 mm Aerotech D21-Ts in the kit and it never fails... I did, however convert the Kappa to a 7' 1 mil thick mylar recovery streamer to shorten the chase after it came down from 5 flights on D-21s to an estimated 1300-1400 feet. The paint job is becoming a little dull and scratched at this point, and it deserves a fresh coat, so one day this summer I'll have her looking showroom new again.