I used to marvel at how much money some of these enthusiasts spent on their high powered rockets such as the launch I saw where a 20 foot tall rocket was launched with a cluster of 5 "M" engines. One engine casing alone for that was many hundreds of dollars. The fuel load for the casing was equally as expensive. Parachutes were huge. Expensive electronics were in place to sense altitude and g-forces to determine when to deploy the chutes.

However, the basic body of the rocket was fiberglass, wood, and cardboard which is fine for the speeds reached if your aim was maybe a few miles up. The types of loads you would hit at the velocity required for orbit would tear that to shreds.

Despite the attention to detail the hobbyists put into their craft and the fact that these devices were very simplistic (no guidance, just fin stabilized), you quickly saw how tough successful rocket flight really is. Failure rates of engines and recovery systems were pretty high. The g-forces you encounter play hell on components and most flights stayed below mach 1. Of course these rockets have to take off pretty quickly for their fins to be effective. Most orbital flights build speed slowly with the majority of the acceleration high in the atmosphere where the air is much thinner.

If you see a hobbyist reach orbit, I'm afraid his craft is going to have to be as well engineered as any NASA launch vehicle. I don't know of any with resources like that.

Art