Birdie
Kit# K-44
Yellow Double Oval Hang Tag - Damon Era
Green or Blue Two Panel Facecard with $0.60 Pricing
Images from eBay
Designer: Bill Simon
Production Years: 1970-1971
Retail Pricing Range: $0.60
Rarity: Very Rare
Description: Second production year with renaming to Astron Birdie. Kit found with yellow double oval Damon hang tag. The facecard is a typical two panel design from that era with black borders. The upper panel features a green to white transition background with Birdie image overlay, Estes logo and 60c in black oval. The Birdie employed featherweight recovery.
During September 2012, a K-44 Astron Birdie kit was offered on eBay and realized $314. Interestingly, the kit has blue upper panel transition to white rather than green to white as previously listed. Following are the kit images from that auction. Did Estes issue two different colored facecards for the TK-44 kit or are the images with green colored upper panel incorrectly taken? Based on the consistency of the yellow double oval hang tag for both sets of images, we might speculate that Estes issued this kit with blue and green facecard varieties.
Images from eBay
Estes Birdie kit was offered as K-44 in the 1969 through 1971 catalogs. This kit version utilized Series III short engines. Starting in the 1972 catalog, the kit was converted to Mini Brute series with mini "T" engines and labeled as TK-44. The conversion to T engines reduced launch weight over the short 18mm engines.
Kit Contents: The Birdie kit contains a plastic badminton shuttlecock, adaptor ring, engine tube and instructions.
Availability: The Birdie K-44 kit is considered to be very rare with only three appearances recorded on eBay since 2008. Two of these appearances occurred during 2012 with the kits bringing $322 and $314 each.
Additional information can be found at the following links;
JimZ Kit Plan Link: Estes K44
RocketReviews: Birdie Clone Review
Specifications: Height: 2.8", Weight: 0.3 oz, Diameter: 2.6"
Recommended Short 18 mm Engines: 1/4A3-2S, 1/2A6-2S
Estes Catalog Artwork
