Controlled Rocket Landing System
Faculty Mentor Name
Bradley Wall
Format Preference
Poster
Abstract
Rocketry has been around for a long time now, however, very few advances have been made. A typical model rocket launch takes between 10 and 60 seconds to reach max altitude. After this, a parachute is ejected from the nose cone and the rocket blows in the wind until landing. The higher the rocket flies, the farther it will land. For the smallest model rockets, this may involve a short walk across a field, however, for larger rockets, it may involve a long search and even loss of the rocket entirely. This project will design a rocket that can safely return to a predetermined location. Having the ability to land the rocket where it started would allow the user to not have to walk to retrieve the rocket. The engineering solution is simply to attach a deployable quad-copter to a rocket that will be used to fly the rocket back to the launchpad after the rocket achieves maximum altitude. This would be achieved via a pilot from the Unmanned Aerial Systems (UAS) club that will fly the rocket to the landing zone. The design consists of four carbon fiber arms attached to the main fuselage of the rocket with motors and propellors on the end of each arm. This will allow for the rocket to be controlled from its peak to the ground, demonstrating the feasibility of the design to develop into a larger project in the future.
Controlled Rocket Landing System
Rocketry has been around for a long time now, however, very few advances have been made. A typical model rocket launch takes between 10 and 60 seconds to reach max altitude. After this, a parachute is ejected from the nose cone and the rocket blows in the wind until landing. The higher the rocket flies, the farther it will land. For the smallest model rockets, this may involve a short walk across a field, however, for larger rockets, it may involve a long search and even loss of the rocket entirely. This project will design a rocket that can safely return to a predetermined location. Having the ability to land the rocket where it started would allow the user to not have to walk to retrieve the rocket. The engineering solution is simply to attach a deployable quad-copter to a rocket that will be used to fly the rocket back to the launchpad after the rocket achieves maximum altitude. This would be achieved via a pilot from the Unmanned Aerial Systems (UAS) club that will fly the rocket to the landing zone. The design consists of four carbon fiber arms attached to the main fuselage of the rocket with motors and propellors on the end of each arm. This will allow for the rocket to be controlled from its peak to the ground, demonstrating the feasibility of the design to develop into a larger project in the future.