What is the Spaceport America Cup? The Spaceport America Cup (SAC) is an international collegiate rocketry competition. Student teams build a rocket that can carry an 8.8 pound payload to either 10,000 or 30,000 feet. This is one of the best collegiate rocket competitions because of their locator at the Spaceport America in New Mexico. Because…
Introduction to GBR If you’re like me, you’ve been getting a deluge of emails about new regulations in Europe kicking into place called the GDPR. Don’t worry, this post isn’t about that. GBR stands for the Gereshes Book Review. I’ve been reading plenty of good engineering/science/math books lately and I’ve wanted to share my thoughts…
Starting on Truck Doors Have you ever seen words on the door of a truck? You know, the words that say it’s from ABC Plumbing, located at XYZ boulevard, and having some phone number? These words are often made out of vinyl and are stuck directly on the side of the door a few letters…
Part 2 of a series on the math behind suicide burns.
Series Overview You can split any project into two parts. The part that you really are excited to do, and everything else. The part you’re excited about often gets most of your attention, and everything else usually gets “just enough” attention to get it done. For example, the question of “What screw should I use…
Rockets are hard. Even when you’ve checked every joint, tightened every screw, and re-rolled your parachute 3 times something can still go wrong. During the same launch as my level one cert flight, there was a catastrophic failure in a different rocket. Just as it was coming off the launch pad, it burst apart into…
Test Stand Rollout This is the fifth and final part in a series about UB SEDS rolling out a test stand to support our in-house propellant program. In this part we validate the test stand using a motor characterize by the manufacturer. Part 1 – Smoke Test Part 2 – Backboard Test Part 3 – Structural Test Part 4…
Test Stand Rollout This is the fourth part in a series about UB SEDS rolling out a test stand to support our in-house propellant program. In this part we test the test stand’s electronics. Part 1 – Smoke Test Part 2 – Backboard Test Part 3 – Structural Test Part 4 – Electronics Test Part 5…
Test Stand Rollout This is the third part in a series about UB SEDS rolling out our test stand to support our in-house propellant program. In this part we test the test stand’s structure. Part 1 – Smoke Test Part 2 – Backboard Test Part 3 – Structural Test Part 4 – Electronics Test Part 5…
Test Stand Rollout This is part 2 in a series covering UB SEDS’s roll out of a test stand to support our in-house propellant program. Part 1 – Smoke Test Part 2 – Backboard Test Part 3 – Test Stand Structural Test Part 4 – Test Stand Electronics Test Part 5 – Test Stand Final…
