Show HN: My high school team’s space probe | Hacker News Reader

Show HN: My high school team’s space probe

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157 pointsJohnOfOsgiliath35 comments

Me and a few friends made this design document as part of our entry to the UK CanSat competition where a high school team is required to build a probe to be launched. The probe must serve some purpose, and ours was to map the temperature and pressure of the air at different altitudes.

We had the opportunity to launch it a week ago and you can find the video of our launch here: https://drive.google.com/file/d/16bsLzxjP7OWRqVvCB62cLv7QYLR...

During the launch we reached 400m above sea level, and the can pulled 70gs successfully. The parachute and can stayed intact. Unfortunately, on the day, we were unable to successfully implement GPS.

The raw results are here: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1oK1vukjcNcsaXMAPeFlzZ66aHlR... And a slightly cleaned up version is here:https://drive.google.com/file/d/1xYhkp3sWoJF0bCkkvFs1AygSdLU...

I used my data presentation software to present our results here: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1-r7lT0J4MDLiYfuaasDXJsr5rCA... The software (in the form of a python script to be executed in blender) can be found here: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1LHP7OwgI_O8t6-NBI0ZPn9JUt2G... It's not pretty, but it works.

The differences in temperature and pressure results were exaggerated in the so that the gradient could be clearly seen.

Unfortunately, we did not get into the final (judged on this document) but it was an awesome experience nevertheless. The judges used this form to mark us: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1eZnum5zuJvkLzY7RLtm9A-NNzxw... We would love to get any feedback from more experienced people, as we intend to do similar projects in the future and at least two of us want to be professional engineers. I'm happy to reply to any comments.

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This is mega levels of dope. Small UI/UX suggestion on your report... Take all of your table borders, and change the color from black to a light gray. The borders add value (communicate the organization of the data). But that data isn't as important as the text/numbers inside the table. "Visual weight should match information relevance"

Great idea

From the UK too. Seeing those docs gave me a total whiplash! I remember the amount of paperwork we had to do for these kind of projects. Funny how nothing has changed.

Yeah. I can't tell you how much time we spent typing in the library. We spent so much time on risk assesment, that we nearly forgot to write about electronics.

It's good practice for working on ESA projects in a professional context ;)

Edit: harsh marking on the risk register. Very realistic practice for dealing with ESA in a professional context! I do like the flowcharts and block diagrams

Yeah, that would be cool. Also, are you an actual aerospace engineer? That's awesome!

I'm not an actual engineer, but I do write actual UK Space Agency and ESA bids for a living. UK Space Agency would be kinder on the marking :)

I get you were just showing support, but as the guy who co-wrote the document, could I drop you an email about work experience?

Sure, feel free to send an email to the email in my profile

Haha, that was my thought when looking through it as well!

Not that NASA is any better. I spend a huge amount of time dealing with pedantic RIDs instead of actually implementing the things I am paid to do...

I'm curious, do you work at NASA?

No, I work at another aerospace company (not in the US). But for some projects I have to work with both ESA and NASA.

Woah! We are fortunate to be able to interact with such interesting people. I don't suppose it would be a little cheeky if I asked if you knew anybody I could ask for work experience.

Interested in your choice of PLA for material.

I only read the first document so apologies if this is covered elsewhere.

But PLA tends to burn/melt/disintegrate in direct sunlight, I imagine its worse outside the atmosphere (Might not be an easily repeatable experiment in the UK however)

Just 1 more thing, the document itself is pretty good for high school. I dont remember touching Gantts and CAD until University so that experience in itself is probably going to be very useful when you hit major projects in your further studies. The failure here is going to help you succeed later. I was in a similar position in high school, I wanted to participate in the solar car challenge, however I couldn't motivate any other students to try or the school to invest in it. Everyone was more afraid of failing and "wasting time" when they should have seen exactly how educational even a failure would be.

To be fair, we probably should have mentioned that. We simply chose PLA because it is easy to manufacture with. Possibly, things could have gone south pretty quickly. If we do something similar again, we could use some fancy machined metal for the housing.

Yeah, I can definitely relate. Fortunately, we had a team who was kind of interested at the start, so we could work from there. To be honest, I've learned so much from this, it's definitly worth the time I put in.

No need to do fancy metal, you can use pre-existing documents and standards about appropriate materials for space, vacuum, etc.

I looked it up and found this: https://www.nasa.gov/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/nasa_std_601...

I quickly read through and found it fascinating.

It is great to see High School projects on HN. Congratulations & wish your team all the best!!

I really appreciate that. I just really enjoy being a part of this community, and I'm glad we can represent the younger generation.

Congratulations on your launch! Super interesting to see all of the technical documentation behind it.

Thanks so much for the kind words. I really enjoyed writing the documentation.

>I really enjoyed writing the documentation.

I'm not sure I've heard anyone say that before. Documentation is usually considered a necessary evil.

That's fair enough, but for me, it was just a really procedural way to think through the process. All the work we did, summarised in one document felt kind of good.

Have you tried entering UKROC? It is great fun and there is very little paperwork required! It is all about designing and building your own rocket. It is for teams of 11-18 year olds in the UK. Mostly schools, but also cadets, scouts and youth clubs.

https://www.ukroc.com/

Regionals are happening around the UK right now. There are equivalent competitions in the USA, France and Japan. The best teams get to compete at the Farnborough or Paris Airshow, which is an incredible experience.

Thanks! I'll check it out.

Great project!!

Interesting that the largest section of the report is the last one called "Social Media outreach" to justify their choices.

Thanks so much. I think we just really wanted to explain our plan on social media (and our outreach person didn't have much to do).

How were you able to tap into the expertise to get to this point? Rocketry isn't something you can just "pick up"! I'm very impressed.

I can't speak for my whole team, but as the programmer/electrical guy/writer I have spent a few years teaching myself skills using the internet. I used YouTube tutorials to learn to code, and use blender, and that sort of thing.

Also, to be fair, we didn't quite build the rocket, we just built the probe.

How much would it cost right now to buy 10% of your future earnings? (Half-kidding.) Kids these days are kind awesome and don't listen to anyone who says otherwise.

I'm really grateful for the kindness. That sort of attitude is great to hear, and I'll keep you in the loop about money ;)

Tangential comment - this might be just me, but the chromatic aberration on the logo is so unpleasant that it really distracts from the content. That's all I see on every page, a bizarre experience really. I'd consider toning it down next time. As they say "the presentation matters" and all that.

That may be right. In future, I think we will use a more unasumming watermark.

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