Certifying Level 3 is no easy accomplishment, but through the combination of careful planning, hard work and following the advice of your certification advisors, you can get the job done.  The process is designed to test the skills and knowledge of the builder in order to prove you are capable of safely flying large, high performance hobby rockets.

Jim Jarvis completed his Level 3 certification at LDRS 25 in supreme fashion, flying a 4" minimum diameter carbon fiber rocket on an N4000 to 35,000 feet!  This qualified Jim for the Tripoli N altitude record without him even knowing he had accomplished the feat. I asked Jim it if would be possible for us to collaborate on a feature article about his rocket and the flight, knowing the readers here would love such a piece.  Being the thorough person that Jim is, he did all the work in order to share his success with everyone. 

It happened way back in 1969.  Jamie Clay, of San Rafael, California, had a birthday, and on this birthday, he got a Hasbro GI Joe Mercury Space Capsule.  Fast forward, thirty years later. Toys-R-Us and Hasbro have re-issued the GI Joe Mercury Space Capsule, and Jamie was better prepared to follow up on his earlier childhood dreams.  He wanted to do a special Level 3 project, and the GI Joe Mercury Space Capsule seemed like a viable subject.  The capsule's base was 9.25" in diameter and all it took was a locating a body tube of that size and the projected began to gel.

The original Estes Mars Lander was always one of Jeff Brudt's all time favorite kits. He remembers when he was 11 years old and seeing one at a local hobby shop.  He had to have it but at that time $9.95 was a lot of money to spend, so he got a job doing yard work for a neighbor and saved to buy it. When it came time build an upscale project, he knew just what to build.

Doug Gerrard has been flying camera rockets for years, having flown dozens of different kinds of cameras from a variety of rockets and configurations. From 110, 35 mm, 8 mm movie, video, and even a large format (4" x 5") camera, he's flown them all.  When it came time to do his Level 3 certification, he knew it would be with a camera rocket, but the real question was how many?

Implementing an 835cc hammerhead-tanked Hypertek hybrid motor during the construction phase of a rocket presents several interesting issues that need to be addressed. Chuck Andrus takes us for a guided tour of his project, "Hyper Active," a scratch built modular design he engineered to resolve those issues and to allow for ultimate flexibility of motor selection.

Jeff Brundt admits to being inspired by Andrew Waddell’s big Saturn V project. While the Saturn V is impressive, he was much more interested in the smaller Saturn 1b. In the past both Estes and Centuri kitted model rocket versions of this NASA launcher.  So Jeff let his inspiration fuel this 1/50 scale Saturn 1B project.