Way back in 2003 I posted a little blip about finishing rockets, and the guy who laminated sheets of uncut one dollar bills to his airframe.

Here are some other interesting finishes I've seen.

On a rocket named Child's Play, the owner had his kids dip their hands in fingerpaint and left primary-colored hand-prints all over the rocket.

Another guy left his unpainted, but every time the rocket flew he wrote the date of the flight on the airframe. The rocket was covered with dates.

One that worked for me was a rocket I named Alchemy. The nosecone is chrome silver, halfway down the body it fades into Rustoleum's hammered silver finish, and near the fins it fades into a fleckstone faux-granite finish. It looks cool, if I do say so myself.

Another finish that I tried to create without success was to use that antique crackle overcoat over flourescent paint. A friend of mine used simple gold under black crackle that came out very nice. I thought it would be cool if the crackle finish exposed neon orange and green jags. Unfortunately, the flourescent finish has too much 'tooth' and wouldn't allow the antique finish to 'crackle' correctly. I sanded and repainted that rocket, trying slightly different techniques, probably four or five times, and never got it to work right. I still like the idea though... maybe someday if I get good enough with an airbrush.

Posted by: Ted at 12:39 PM | category: Rocketry
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1 Ted, try wet-sanding the undercoat with 600 grit sandpaper and then putting a coat of Future Floor Finish over that to gloss it. Then put the crackle coat on top and see how it goes.

Posted by: Maelstrom at January 25, 2005 08:05 PM (/NFjN)

2 Been there, done that. Problem with flourescent colors is that it needs that rough pebbly surface for the flouresc effect. Sanding it smooth or topcoating or both dulls it down to ordinary.

Posted by: Ted at January 25, 2005 08:56 PM (ZjSa7)

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