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Originally Posted by stefanj
It is cool that one MRI kit, the Zenith, is still in production by Quest. Has a clear payload section and plastic cone now, but pretty much the same design.
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This is a corner of model rocket history that really needs to be illuminated. I also have a question, which Bill's posting inspired--I've included it below. Now, I had thought (apparently in error, at least partly) that Quest's kits--the old-design ones, which pre-dated Quest's creation--had all begun life in the late 1960s and/or the early 1970s (I welcome any corrections, additions, and/or clarifications), and had gone through roughly three phases, as follows:
[1] MPC offered model rocket kits (made of balsa-and-paper, at least some of which had builder-customize-able options, such as alternate printed-on-sheet-balsa-fins), which used 18 mm motors. (I don't know what their earliest launch pads and launch controllers were like--I *think* their plastic launch pad and their car cigarette lighter-powered, "Lunar-Lectric" launch controller [someone should offer 3D printed, working replicas of these!
*Hint, hint...*] came later, during their "Stine era"). Then:
[2] After MPC hired G. Harry Stine as a consultant (was this perhaps in 1971?), they added to their product line new kits that used 18 mm motors, and also "Minirocs"--smaller, high-performance models that used "Minijet" motors (which were 'long' [compared to Estes's mini motors] 13 mm "A" and "B" motors). The Miniroc kits, which included sport, competition, scale, scale-like, and boost-glider models, used 15 mm diameter body tubes--which Quest still uses today--with "internal sleeve-fitting," BT-5-size motor mount tubes, and two different balsa nose cones (a 5:1 tangent ogive and a 1.75" elliptical nose [which was only used in their Pipsqueak kit), and:
The MPC Miniroc kits (most of which used 10" parachutes--their 15 mm body tubes had sufficient room inside--while a few had streamers) included an injection-molded plastic detail parts set, some of which were aluminized. The Miniroc kits were packed in a card-backed, clear plastic "blister pack," which could be either hung on a wall display rock, or stacked in a counter-top display box. The flattish, rectangular plastic "blister" also included molded-in corrugations (like those seen on Jupiter and Saturn rockets), canopies, and other small details on its edges, which could be cut out and glued to the rockets using epoxy or contact cement, if desired. Also:
The larger (18 mm motor powered models), which were intended to be sold through department stores as well as hobby shops (like Estes's Citation series of kits [other YORF members can recount MPC's model rocketry travails with K-Mart better than I...), were packed in shrink wrap plastic-sealed boxes for shelf display, just like plastic model airplane and model car kits. These model rocket kits had injection-molded plastic nose cones (and often also molded plastic fin units [or plastic fins and locking rings] and transition sections); those with balsa fins came with printed fin sheets. These kits included--but were not limited to--scale models (the Nike-Smoke and single-stage Tomahawk, and scale-like kits that used their parts). Finally:
[3] While it's possible that they might have intended to release a more extensive line of the following type of rocket kits, MPC's last two model rocket kits were "display or fly" scale models of the Titan IIIC and the Vostok. Those who have built and flown them have reported that they are better "display" than "flying" models, being heavy for their size, under-powered with their recommended motors, and doing best with high-thrust/short delay motors. (It has also been mentioned that the parachute compartment volume is uncomfortably small--and that the heat from ejection charges [and the flame from "post-ejection residual delay charge burning," in composite 18 mm motors] will warp and even melt the models' plastic bodies in that area, unless special precautions are taken. Using an aluminized Mylar parachute makes for a looser fit, and the inside walls of the parachute compartment can be lined with Nomex felt or "stone-ized," stage coupler "fish paper," or both [those who have successfully made and flown such modified models could provide more details].) Not very long after these two kits were released, MPC got out of the model rocket business (there was a motor plant explosion that resulted in one or more fatalities, which others here could describe better than I), and at some point after that:
If I have the history right (which, I freely concede, I may not), the late Myke Bergenske acquired the MPC inventory (including, apparently, their motors and their motor-making equipment [although he might not have come into the picture until AVI became AVI Astrport; I just don't know]). I have read, elsewhere here on YORF, that the kits and motors were stored for several years in a number of semi-trailers sitting on a lot, in non-climate-controlled conditions. (I can readily believe that, judging by the "puffed-up" appearance of several of my Miniroc kits' balsa nose cones, and by the "black 'rot' infection" [like what I've seen on a dead tree] on one of their body tubes.) Plus:
AVI offered some of the MPC kits, and/or kits of their own that used the MPC plastic nose cones and fin units. They also offered new motors (which were provided with thin heat-protective outer liners), and introduced glued-in variable-delay modules (I wish that innovation had been accepted and caught on!). The original-production MPC motors--18 mm and 13 mm--were apparently virtually "guaranteed to CATO," due to having been stored as haphazardly as they were (with regard to temperature and humidity changes) for so long. That could explain AVI's new motors, and why--due to the cost of developing, certifying, and producing their new motors--the company folded not long afterward (those were the post-Apollo, but pre-Shuttle, "slow years" of the hobby). Finally:
After a few years of a wraith-life existence (under the name "AVI Astroport," which I last saw listed in the model rocket products manufacturers listing in a 1978 issue of NASA's employee magazine), it disappeared. Not until the early 1990s, when Quest opened, did I see such kits and parts (including the MPC injection-molded plastic detail parts, and their plastic airframe parts) offered for sale to the general public again (although ACME Rocket Company had some old Centuri and MPC kits a bit before--and perhaps after--Quest began operatione). Now, regarding the question that Bill's posting had inspired:
He wrote that his old kits, which were/are, directly or indirectly, connected with MPC/AVI/AVI Astroport/Quest, were originally made by MRI (those letters stand for "Model Rocket Industries," yes?). Did MPC--or maybe AVI, and/or AVI Astroport--buy out MRI (or buy their inventory, and then later make more, new-production kits under their "new" [post-MRI] name)? Other than knowing the names and the appearances of a few of these kits (from the AVI Astroport "fire sale" catalog [they didn't *call* it that, but it sure connotes that feeling!] on the Ninfinger Productions website), I have no idea about their history.
Many thanks in advance to anyone who can help! (I'm sure there are other YORF members who are also interested in these and other obscure kits's histories [Roto-Rocket is another little-known--other than its name--model rocket company...])