ESRA (Team Delta)

Experimental Sounding Rocket Association

Intercollegiate Rocket Engineering Competition (IREC)

Project Overview

Team Delta Force’s goal is to design and build a rocket that will be launched in the Experimental Sounding Rocket Association (ESRA) Intercollegiate Rocketry Competition (IREC) in June of 2016. The rocket shall fly to an altitude of 19,000 feet, using a self-made and designed solid O-class motor, carrying a scientific payload of the team’s design. The rocket shall have redundant recovery and tracking systems and must land without damage in order to be considered a successful flight. All of the rocket’s major subsystems are designed and made by the team; commercial parts are not permissible for major subsystems.

The body tube for the rocket is going to be manufactured from a fiber-glass weave which will overlay phenolic tube to be used as a molding and will be an approximate length of 10 feet. The tube will be created in a couple of pieces along with couplers which will allow them to be fitted together. The nose cone will be shaped from foam disks which will be sanded to the appropriate size and then encased in carbon fiber. The fins will be made from carbon fiber as well and will potentially be water cut. The avionics components will be purchased from commercial retailers. The parachute will be reverse-ngineered from a pre-existing parachute that has been purchased and the same method will be employed to scale the chute in order to fit our rocket’s needs. The motor is perhaps the most crucial component and will be made using ammonium perchlorate composite propellant. The aluminum casing will be approximately 6”x36” and purchased from the manufacturing company Gorilla so as to ensure correct certification and safety is met. The motor fuel itself will be mixed and tested until sufficient accuracy and efficiency is reached in comparison to known motor data.

More information can be found on the ESRA website:

http://www.soundingrocket.org/

Current Design

Team Delta

Vedran Caus -Structures lead, Project Manager

Jacob Coleman- Recovery lead

Kevin Gordon- Payload lead, Systems lead, Recorder

Stephen Pierce - Propulsion lead, Archivist

Jacob Purcell- Stability lead, Archivist

Special thanks to Boeing Mentor David Allsop, Major Bryan Sparkman, Dan Welling of The Lectro Engineering Company, and senior design professors Dr. Ray LeBeau and Dr. Douglas Schwaab