Profit-less Space Program Launches In One Week

August 23, 2010 by Mike Szczys 40 Comments

The Copenhagen Suborbitals are now within one week of their first launch. We looked in on the non-profit and non-secretive space program back in March but we had no idea the group had a frickin’ submarine at their disposal. What you see above is the rocket on its floating launch platform. The submarine will haul it out into the Baltic Sea for launch. There’s not much room in the craft for an astronaut but it will be a horrifying an exhilarating flight. According to the spacecraft page the human payload will be in a half-sitting, half-standing position looking up through an acrylic nose dome. This first launch will not be manned, but once they get through the tests this will be one crazy ride.

DIY Guided Missile (…err Model Rocket)

August 3, 2010 by Jake W 116 Comments

Hackers [Navic] and [K.o.D] have fitted an Arduino Pro Mini and an array of components into an off the shelf rocketry kit to create a guided model rocket, taking the whole idea of Arduino-based space technology to another level

The Arduino reads signals from internally mounted accelerometers, and adjusts balsa fins (via 4 micro servos) to correct the rocket’s flight path. Due to the nature of model rocketry, the active guidance is limited to the 3 seconds that the rocket is traveling upwards. A valiant effort nevertheless. Videos of the rocket’s maiden voyage, and a system check after the break. Continue reading “DIY Guided Missile (…err Model Rocket)” →

Missile Hack Taunts Your Cat

January 5, 2010 by Mike Szczys 8 Comments

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3K7rTWnuQ6Y]

[Atlantageek] sent in a missile launcher project that he threw together. For Christmas he received a Chumby One and a ThinkGeek USB Rocket Launcher as gifts (lucky dog). Neither of these toys are “played with” in the traditional sense as much as they become centerpieces of your next hack. In that spirit, [Atlantageek] immediately wrote a widget to control the launcher via the Chumby. The side effect of driving his cat bonkers was an unexpected bonus.

Missile Command On IPhone With Real Missiles

December 24, 2009 by Mike Szczys 13 Comments

[Jeff] and his team completed this iPhone controlled rocket launcher as part of their final project at Georgia Tech. Two servos provide the rotation referenced by an onboard electronic compass, and elevation control for launch. These are interfaced with an eBox 2300 using a few Phidgets boards.

Check out the launch video below. It’s too bad that they went with a commercial solution for servo control rather than building it themselves (especially considering it is an embedded systems class). But it is a nice build none the less. Now they need to add some imaging equipment to the rockets and they’ll be in business.

Continue reading “Missile Command On IPhone With Real Missiles” →

Jet Powered Hijinks

September 29, 2009 by Caleb Kraft 21 Comments

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tjS8btFb9RA]

This jet powered carousel is brought to you by the Madagascar Institute. They convene, or collide, to create large scale art, sculptures, and rides. This one seems to fit the last definition. The two gentlemen are strapped to a jet powered carousel. It actually looks pretty fun, but we would have been needing some fresh shorts after the jet bursts into flames near the end. He didn’t seem too concerned, he wasn’t screaming and flailing his arms at least.

Rocket Acceleration Logger

April 8, 2009 by Nick Caiello 17 Comments

rocketdatalogger

Have you ever wondered how high or how fast a model rocket goes when you launch it? [sprite_tm] did, so he decided to build a low cost, lightweight data logger that he could fit into the nose cone of his rocket. To keep the circuit small, he built it around the popular ATtiny13 microcontroller. The microcontroller collects data from a Freescale MMA7260, a 3-axis accelerometer that he extracted from a third-party Wii nunchuck controller. After the microcontroller collects the data, it’s stored in 32K of EEPROM on a 24C256. All of this is powered by a small 3.6v Li-ion battery, which is the largest part of the circuit. If this sounds like something you’d like to make, he has detailed instructions along with the software used available on his site. While we don’t launch a lot of model rockets here, we may soon start just so that we have an excuse to build this.

Rocketting Fun

March 11, 2009 by Caleb Kraft 14 Comments

cansat

[Gabe] sent in this project summary from his rocketry club’s yearly project(pdf). The goal was to build a rocket that would go up to about 800 meters and eject a robot that would pilot itself to a destination on the ground for re use. There’s tons of great information from what hardware is in the robot to hardware design for the ejection mechanism. There are great pictures of the final build, not so many of the construction itself. The project seemed to go well until EMI problems caused everything to fail during flight. If you’re interested in seeing more from the club, check out their site (translated).