Outline:
Some of our members worked on building a rocket for the first UKSEDS National Rocketry Championship! The goal: to build a rocket to launch an interesting scientific or technological payload to an altitude of 1000m and return it safely to Earth, with the rocket ready to be reused.
Timeline:
December 2013: UKSEDS offically announces NRC 2014.
February 2014: Begin design and simulation phase of build.
May – July 2014: Order necessarily parts for build.
August – September 2014: Build and test rocket before launching.
Blog:
See the blog for this project here.
Pictures:
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- Set-up and organised, ready to start the first stage of building.
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- Lee Staples cutting the Phenolic tubing air frame.
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- Christopholos Hickey sanding down the coupler tube (it was too wide, so we had to cut it down a bit).
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- Everything cut down to size and ready to be fitted together.
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- Christopholos Hickey thinking about engine retention.
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- Robert Sandford thinking about engine retention.
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- Christopholos Hickey & Lee Staples admiring their work.
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- Lee Staples taping guidelines on air frame, an ingenious way of cutting straight fin mounts.
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- Sanding down the leading edges of the fins.
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- Sanding down the leading edges of the fins.
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- Lee Staples & Christopholos Hickey sanding down the fin mounts.
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- Christopholos Hickey doing… something. Probably very important.
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- Christopholos Hickey affixing the coupler tube to the payload section.
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- The finished engine mount.
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- Christopholos Hickey fitting the engine mount inside of the air frame.
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- Christopholos Hickey & Lee Staples affixing fins to air frame.
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- Christopholos Hickey, Robert Sandford, & Lee Staples showing off their proud work.
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- Second stage of making rocket for NRC 2014.
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- Making the fins more stable by adding epoxy putty fillets.
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- Sanding down the fin fillets to make rocket more aerodynamic.
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- Fin fillets much smoother and more aerodynamic after sanding down with cylindrical piece of Nylon.
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- Obligatory picture looking down length of air frame.
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- Take a look down the phenolic tube air frame, you can see the coupler tube too.
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- We got a sweet paint-job, same paint used on Boeing aeroplane wings. So smooth we had to re-adjust simulations.
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- We got a sweet paint-job, same paint used on Boeing aeroplane wings. So smooth we had to re-adjust simulations.
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- We got a sweet paint-job, same paint used on Boeing aeroplane wings. So smooth we had to re-adjust simulations.
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- We got a sweet paint-job, same paint used on Boeing aeroplane wings. So smooth we had to re-adjust simulations.
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- Engine retention bolts held in place with epoxy resin.
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- Engine retention bolts with engine mount.
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- Engine mount held in place with nuts & bolts.
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- Our engine retention idea worked a treat.
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- Stencil work on the side of our first rocket.
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- 3D printed nose-cone from Shapeways finishes off the rocket nicely.
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- GPS for the flight computer.
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- GPS for the flight computer.
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- GPS for the flight computer.
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- Accelerometer & Gyroscope for the flight computer.
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- Some of the electronics for the flight computer: GPS, Accelerometer & Gyroscope.
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- Top of flight computer.
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- Side of flight computer.
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- Bottom of flight computer.
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- Our fully assembled flight computer. Little too big though, needs tweaking.
