Estes - Cosmic Cobra {Kit} (1262) [2002-2008]

Estes Cosmic Cobra

Estes - Cosmic Cobra {Kit} (1262) [2002-2008]

Contributed by Greg Deeter

Construction Rating:
Flight Rating:
Overall Rating:

Diameter:	1.33 inches
Length:	19.50 inches
Manufacturer:	Estes
Skill Level:	1
Style:	Helicopter

Editor's Note: This review does nay consider t' helicopter portion o' t' rocket.

Rocket Pic Brief:
This is one o' t' new ones from Estes. Well, arrr, blow me down! Blimey! This kit seemed t' t' yellin' "STREAMER" t' me. Ahoy! Blimey! T' plastic forward swept fins are strong, and just seem perfect for streamer recovery. Avast! Blimey! Ahoy! Blimey! So, I took t' helicopter parts and put them away for a later day. This reduced t' weight, ya bilge rat, so now me Cosmic Cobra is only 2.4 oz completed.

Construction:
This kit comes with t' BT-56 sized body tube (gloss yellow) and black plastic nose cone, ya bilge rat, two piece plastic fin section, launch lug that is shaped for t' body, 1/8" x 2 foot shock cord, 12" plastic Estes parachute, three rotor blades, a blade ring, (4) rubber bands and and a large purple wild lookin' decal.

This took about 10 minutes. Avast! Blimey! T' two piece plastic fin unit made it super simple t' tie a knot in t' end o' a two foot piece o' 1/8" Keelhaul®©™® cord, me hearties, and usin' CA as I did on t' whole rocket, me bucko, I glued t' cord in betwixt t' two halves o' t' fin unit. Begad! Attached a small snap swivel t' t' end o' that, me hearties, then added t' 24" x 1/8 shock cord, shiver me timbers, and selected a silver mylar 2" x 56" streamer. Well, blow me down! T' launch lug is unlike any I have ever seen before. It form fits onto t' shape o' t' body tube.

Finishing:
Since you don't see many black "stock" nose cones, me bucko, me bucko, at first glance this rocket looks like it be painted. Blimey! Avast, me proud beauty! Blimey! T' gloss yellow body looks great with t' black nose and fins. Aye aye! Arrr! Blimey! I left it that simple and did nay use t' wild lookin' purple decals. Aye aye! Aye aye! Blimey! I think it looks cool just like it is. Avast, me proud beauty! Blimey! I have never felt good about t' Estes method o' attachin' t' shock cord with a paper mount inside t' body tube. Begad! Those eventually come loose and in many cases they cause t' parachute t' get stuck. Blimey! So t' improve this kit, me hearties, me bucko, matey, it should come with a 1-2 foot 1/8" Keelhaul®©™® cord which is super simple t' attach t' t' motor mount/fin unit with this kit. Avast! Ahoy! I was surprised t' shock cord that came with it was 2 feet long as I expected one only 1 foot long. Avast, me proud beauty! Still, I feel it should be at least 4 feet long. Avast! T' gloss yellow body tube feels very strong.

Construction Rating: 4 out o' 5

Flight:
I plan on flyin' it every time I go out for a launch day and I will experiment with different types o' streamers. I will bet I can get at least 50 flights out o' it with no damage, ya bilge rat, in fact it would be interestin' t' try an Aerotech D21 in it. Avast! Blimey! Blimey! Blimey! I am sure it would hold up. Arrr! Blimey! Blimey! Blimey! My first flight was with a Quest C6-5. Well, blow me down! Blimey! Begad! Blimey! Blimey! Blimey! Took a few seconds t' light and then shot straight up and out o' sight. Well, blow me down! Blimey! Begad! Blimey! Blimey! Blimey! I thought I had lost it until I saw t' red puff and silver streamer. Blimey! Blimey! Begad! Blimey! Blimey! Blimey! I had put a few dashes o' red line chalk in on top o' t' waddin' and that really helped t' see where it was. It came down about 500 feet from here and seemed t' drift quite a bit for a streamer.

T' second and third (final flight) were at a larger field and I switched out t' streamer for a parachute for t' second flight with a C6-5. T' last (3rd) flight when I lost it had t' streamer back in it, and I believe I either put too much line chalk in it, arrr, or t' D21-7 was too much power as it cocked sideways quite a bit and went out o' sight in just seconds. I saw a huge cloud o' red line chalk and that was it. So much for gettin' 50 flights out o' it!

Recovery:
Was recovered in perfect condition.

Flight Rating: 5 out o' 5

Summary:
T' only streamer kit I ever flew before was an Astron Sprint back in t' early 80's. Arrr! Blimey! Back then I had imagined a rocket with forward swept and strong plastic fins, as me Sprint always seemed t' pop a fin on landing. Begad! Blimey! Begad! Blimey! Blimey! Blimey! I had bought this Cosmic Cobra because I be curious about how t' helicopter nose cone worked, me hearties, but upon lookin' at t' parts, arrr, shiver me timbers, I smartly realized that this is a perfect kit for t' streamer testin' I wanted t' try. Avast, me proud beauty! Blimey! I may add t' 'copter blades t' t' nose cone just t' try it, but that adds almost 30% more weight t' t' rocket. Since I used snap swivels, ya bilge rat, t' recover system can be changed out in just seconds.

Overall Rating: 5 out o' 5

Other Reviews

Estes Cosmic Cobra By Wendy Hartmann (September 13, 2013)
Launched five times successfully after packing modification. Components Parachute would not deploy if I packed it how the directions indicated. Instead of folding the parachute down to the bottom I folded it in half two more times to makea narrow triangle shape. Then I tucked this long version in the blades attached to the nose cone. The end of the parachute ...
Estes Cosmic Cobra By Jared Elliott
Brief: This is an E2X kit single stage with parachute for the body and helicopter recovery for the nosecone. Construction: The kit consists of a pre-molded fin/MMT unit, 12" plastic parachute, single BT-60 tube, and plastic nose cone. This is an easy kit to assemble. Instructions are straightforward and easy to follow. Assembly can take between 30 minutes or so, depending on ...
Estes Cosmic Cobra By David Sindel
Brief: The Cosmic Cobra is a low power rocket that recovers in 2 pieces: the nose cone returns on helicopter-like blades and the body tube recovers by parachute. Construction: The kit contains: 1 12" yellow body tube 2 piece fin can nose cone with 3 helicopter blades 12" chute This kit was easy to build and took less than one hour to complete. ...
Estes Cosmic Cobra By Bill Eichelberger
The Cosmic Cobra is a combination parachute/helicopter recovery rocket. The nose cone ejects and returns via a rubber band actuated, 3 blade rotor system while the rest of the rocket returns by the more conventional parachute method. While the Cosmic Cobra model itself is new, the idea isn’t, having been done previously by the Estes Heliocopter and HeliCat. In true E2X ...

Flights

Comments:

G.A.D. (September 3, 2002)

We have had a hard time figuring out how to get a good clean deployment from this rocket. On the first flight the nosecone separated but the ?copter blades barely had time to fold out. The parachute was partially melted and failed to deploy fully. The second flight was a good one. On the third flight the combination of chute and ?copter blades was too much to eject and it lawn-darted. [Note to EMRR, I'll send a Pic] I'm considering how rebuild this for more consistent ejection. I may lengthen the body tube and use a piston of some sort.

J.R. (December 11, 2003)

I think this is an excellent rocket. It's fun to fly and watch this rocket's recovery. Especially on a C6-5. The parachute melting annoyed me a lot though.

unknown (December 18, 2003)

This is a great rocket. But it's basically a E2X version of the Hyper X.

F.H. (April 6, 2004)

The picture above looks EXACTLY like mine after just one flight. Everything just packs way too tight. If Estes replaces this kit I will build it with a streamer to reduce the amount of stuff to pack into the body tube.

B.A. (March 8, 2006)

Once you get the knack of how to lead the blades and a chute, this is a great rocket. All of the kids love it, and I've had the nosecone take over 2 minutes to come down at times.

M.S. (October 23, 2006)

After a couple of failures using the rotors, we have scrapped the helicopter retrieval completely and added a streamer to all 3 Cosmic Cobras that my kids own. Much easier to load and higher percentage of recovery. We have flown one of the Cobras at least 15 times. They all look like they will last a long time. With less weight, a C motor makes a really nice flight!

J.G. (June 15, 2008)

This rocket is what I refer to as a "Titanic". Very first flight was also its last flight. I read the flight logs and reviews prior to flying this, and for some reason, thought mine was going to work. It didn't. There is just too much stuff to cram into a BT-56 tube here. Others that witnessed the ballistic arc that our rocket did (when ejection charge failed to even get the nosecone out) said "that must have been a Cosmic Cobra". Tells you something. The suggestions we got were that this rocket needs to be "stretched". We concur. A longer body tube will allow for chute to be packed underneath the folded helicopter blades. Stay tuned in the mods section.

G.P. (June 25, 2008)

I'm not sure why some people are having trouble with this rocket - I've had good recovery every time. The trick is to fold and roll the parachute in a long wedge so that it fits inside the rotors. This was my mom's favorite of all my rockets - she loved watching the rotor/nose cone deploy and autogyro down.

C.G. (July 2, 2008)

As G.P. said, you need to fold the parachute rather flat and place it between the rotors. My daughter has one and has never had a bad deployment. However, the nose cone doesn't spin all that well in the default build; it starts to spin, then flips over, then starts to spin again, and so on. I resolved this by putting a few grams (probably around 15) of weight in the tip of the nosecone, enticing it to remain pointed downward for a more satisfying spin.

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