Centuri Gabriel Clone
 

I got inspired to clone something and saw a Gabriel kit on eBay, and upon further looking into it I decided this would be it...

I got most of the stuff figured, Semroc rocks!, but I am curious about a few things:

1. What is the diameter of the wooden dowels?
2. What is the thickness of the balsa fin material?
3. Wondering if decals are available anywhere?

The only other thing I am trying to figure out is the fin dimensions. I have the plans downloaded but am wondering how the .tiff image scales to get the right size fins or is it already to scale? This would be my first attempt at cloning something from plans and diagrams so I might have some more questions as I go...

Thanks for the kind words!

The dowels are 1/8" x 6".

The nose cone is Centuri BC-82 , Semroc BC-819.

The fins are 3/32". I thought we had them online, but I can't find them now.

The decals are black and white silkscreened. That is one of the reasons we did not finish the Gabriel. The white does not scan vey well on my scanner.

The other reason is the marginal stability. Sure looks like it needs nose weight!

If anyone has a scan of the decals, I will be glad to take a whack at drawing them.

Phred

Thanks for the info Carl, I have not had a chance to throw it in Rocksim yet to check out the physics. If nothing else I can always tinker with the fin sizes to get it better, though it would be a clone it would not be a clone :)

Question would be is it ok to tweak a clone design and still call it a clone of the original?

OK. I was doing some math on the length of the Gabriel. I think the book states it is 14.25" long, the plans on YORP claim the BT = 10.5", the ET sticks out 1.625", so the BC must be 2.125" => 10.5+1.625+2.125=14.25. However the Semroc cone is 1.9" so therefore my BT must be 10.725".

Am I being too particular about all this? I suppose your all going to tell me to just build the dang thing the way I want and be happy :D And that lengths are always a little suspect, especially in the older stuff...

I would not trust the book length, weights, etc. on Centuri kits! I have found that you can not even trust the instructions, which were usually made before the final parts decisions. The Gabriel nose cone is 1.9" in my kit (6/78). That is the one I used to do our BC-819. The body tube is 10.5". Since the Centuri Gabriel is a "scale-like" kit, even they took liberties from the original design. :)

Awesome info Carl, thanks again... I think I have the fins close to size, I am gonna throw in Rocksim this weekend and tweak. The order for parts is going out next week, figure I should plan something else also so I can get a few more things from ya... Gotta decide on a kit I think. Hmmmmmm.

Update: Order placed (Sat). Also picked up some extra stuff so I can get around to building the V-32 that I thought was a neat idea. And of course I had to order a kit while I was at it. :)