University of Florida PDR Presentation

Vehicle Design

Diameter: 5.86”Length: 135”Static Stability Margin: 1.4Total Weight: 23.6 lbs

Payload Bay

Inside Rocket Separated From Rocket

Vehicle Materials

• Airframe: phenolic tube with fiberglass reinforcement

• Fins: 1/8” G-10 fiberglass• Bulkheads and Centering Rings: Birch Plywood• Shock Cord: 5/8” Tubular Nylon• Motor Retention: Aluminum sleeve

Vehicle Safety and Testing

• Structures verification– Fin load testing– Coupler joints– Motor retention testing

• Stability verification– RockSim– MATLAB

Recovery System Design

Rocket Drogue: 24” round Descent Rate: 80 ft/s

Rocket Main: 84” round Descent Rate: 21 ft/s

Payload Drogue: Heavy Duty StreamersDescent Rate: Undetermined

Payload Main: 60” roundDescent Rate: 19.5 ft/s

Recovery Safety and Testing

• Black powder charge ground testing• Parachute and streamer descent rate

verification• Payload bay separation testing• Payload landing testing• Flight computer & GPS testing in Avionics Bay

and Payload Bay

Motor Choice• Cesaroni K590– Average Thrust = 591 N; Max Thrust = 724 N– Total Impulse = 1336.5 Ns– T.W. Ratio = 5.635

Motor Safety and Testing

• Static Motor Testing– Tests our ability to assemble a K590 Motor– Tests the burn profile of the motor to check with

RockSim and online predictions

Flight Simulations

MATLAB vs. RockSim

Why use MATLAB?

• MATLAB can easily be used in optimization– RockSim may only be optimized through tedious

iteration. Time-consuming and inflexible• Design space visualization– 3D/4D plots

Preliminary Results

• MATLAB 1DOF is surprisingly accurate when RockSim simulates a wind speed of zero

Future Work

• MATLAB model will be extended to 3DOF• Compared with RockSim for various wind

speeds• RockSim and MATLAB models compared to

launch data. Best-fit determined

Payload Design

• Two 1/8" G-10 fiberglass cards mated with XBee Pro 900 transmitter in between– One card holds: R-DAS Tiny, PerfectFlite

altimeters, two batteries– Second card holds: GPS, transmitter card,

temperature and humidity sensor, JPEG trigger• Camera attached to inside of payload bay

looking out

Payload Design

Science Value of Payload Experiment• To test modern hydrologic theory– Comparing the theoretical total long and short

wave radiation to recorded data

• To establish an accurate measurement of the environmental lapse rate for temperature and pressure

Predictions from Hydrologic Theory

6:00 AM 7:59 AM 9:59 AM 11:59 AM 1:59 PM 3:59 PM 5:59 PM0.0

20.0

40.0

60.0

80.0

100.0

120.0

140.0

Long Wave Radiation in April 2010, Huntsville, Alabama

4/10/20104/11/20104/12/20104/13/20104/14/20104/15/20104/16/20104/17/2010Average

Time

Long

Wav

e Ra

diati

on (W

/m2)

6:00 AM 7:59 AM 9:59 AM 11:59 AM 1:59 PM 3:59 PM 5:59 PM0.0

100.0200.0300.0400.0500.0600.0700.0800.0

Short Wave Radiation in April 2010, Huntsville, Alabama

4/10/20104/11/20104/12/20104/13/20104/14/20104/15/20104/16/20104/17/2010Average

Time

Shor

t Wav

e Ra

diati

on (W

/m2)

Lapse Rates

• Temperature lapse rate estimated to be somewhere between 6°C/km and 10°C/km• Pressure lapse rate found from Perfect Gas

Law

Source: Figure 3.2.2 from Applied Hydrology by Chow, Ven T., David R. Maidment, and Larry W. Mays. International ed. New York: McGraw-Hill, 20051988. Print.

Payload Testing

• Solar cell has range of 430 to 1100 nm. Test the voltage-to-W/m2-conversion-constant

• UV sensor voltage-to-W/m2-conversion-constant

• Sensor-to-RDAS configuration• Note: Will need IR sensor to measure “long

wave” radiation ( > 4 μm)