Me and a few friends took on the challenge of creating a TVC (thrust vector control) stabilized rocket from scratch. This is the unexpected journey we went on to achieve that goal.
Hey man! Its me William from EPIC. Wow this is so cool! :) You are doing ivy league collage level stuff and documenting it all! Wished that I could do something like this!
I'm an aerospace engineer and have two words for you: Liquid. Fuel. And carbon fiber. So actually four words. Produce a fully reusable (presumably 2 stage) LEO launch vehicle with an optimum payload size and put SpaceX out of business. Also you need some Star Trek references in your videos.
I believe that liquid fuel would provide us with better control and enhance the weight-to-thrust efficiency of our propellant. Would we have to make our own motor, or is there a premade brand you would recommend? Implementing carbon fiber would be easy by simply replacing the PLA filament with CF. The only non-reusable part of the rocket is the motor. We're so close! There may or may not be some Star Trek memes in the next video. That being said, putting SpaceX out of business might be a bit more of a challenge 🤣. Thanks for the advice; it's so cool to get feedback from an aerospace engineer! P.S., there’s a snack compartment above the flight computer for payloads :)
this is really cool man the fact this was pulled off, keep up the great work, perhaps this concept could be used for horizontal flight as well, for hyper maneuverability, in a rocket powered plane setting?
We’ll definitely apply TVC to other projects, one thought was to have the rocket launch horizontally off of the top of an RC plane and correct upwards or in a predetermined pattern. If I am understanding your idea correctly, directly powering a plane with TVC’d rocked engines is also a possibility, although we’re going to focus on keeping it in the rocket form factor while we’re still fine tuning it. We just want to steer clear of any kind of “guidance” system, if you know what I mean 😅. Thanks for the words of encouragement!
Yeah no problem, That sounds sick, kinda like a space shuttle air launch or like a cargo plane with it falling out of the payload door or bomb bay, if you do go through with that project please make a video on it. Would love to see that
One more thing, one of the hurdles I see that you may want to account for is the release, if your going to carry the rocket on the top it would effect the carrier planes flight path and may burn the top of the plane but with tv, you could direct the nozzle so it would lessen the blow. So maybe dropping it from the belly depending on altitude, will give you more time to correct the flight path. None the less, it will take a few lines of code 😅 but I’m sure you can make it happen
I’ve been wanting to make an underground silo (to launch the rocket out of), thanks for the suggestion! Also it’s a stabilized rocket, not a guided missile. 😅
Do you plan to scale it up and shoot for other goals and if so how would you plan to do that since Im assuming it would be a bit harder to gimbal the entire motor if it was that large. All in all thats dope and wish you luck man
We haven’t decided what we want to do next with the rocket, but you have a good point with the upscaling. If we wanted a longer burn time, one solution might be to include multiple deployable stages instead of trying to use a single larger motor. We’re also currently looking into implementing a trapezoidal-PID gradient algorithm and adding a reaction wheel for z-axis stability. Thanks for the words of encouragement!
Not counting the tools we already had (3d printers, drills, soldering iron, etc), I would say that R and D costed about $400 in lost materials, and a final rocket costs about $50 to make. This doesn’t take into consideration the cost to drive out to the desert 3 times.
MK- TH-cam won't let me reply to your response so I'm posting my reply here, we'll see if it works- I'm not aware of any hobby scale flight capable liquid propellant rocket engines, maybe check eBay and Amazon but you probably need to make your own. Goddard did it 100 years ago without the internet, though of course he was a physics professor. Solids are generally for military applications and aren't appropriate for man rating. And aerospace CF isn't PLA with CF, it's CF reinforced epoxy. PLA/CF is basically stronger plastic. 3D printing is good for making molds for CF/epoxy, maybe use PLA or PLA/CF for that, or whatever google says. And my comment said reusable LEO launch vehicle. "LEO" means Low Earth Orbit, which you're a fair distance from but you have plenty of time. I'll ponder appropriate Trekisms. And you shouldn't fly an instrumented mouse in the snack compartment and you definitely shouldn't put it on TH-cam.
I'll just stick to PLA for now, it's light/strong enough and prints really well at fast speeds. Achieving Low Earth Orbit sounds pretty hard considering the scale of our rocket, we're only reaching about 120 feet of altitude right now. I would never put a mouse in the rocket, at least not until we have a smooth propulsive landing (JK). Thanks for the feedback again, you're really getting my gears turning. -Miles
No, we used an Estes F15 solid motor. Although we definitely would of had more customization options if we made our own rocket candy fuel, reliability was really important to us since the thrust vector control was so sensitive.
Congratulations!! This video is awesome by the way, stoked to see more!
Thanks, I appreciate all the advice you’ve given me through your videos and at Open Sauce!
Love the TVC mount design! Congrats and best of luck with future projects!
Hey man! Its me William from EPIC. Wow this is so cool! :) You are doing ivy league collage level stuff and documenting it all! Wished that I could do something like this!
That so cool nice project guys !
Was not expecting such a good video! Congratulations on your achievement and wishing you the best of luck going forward!
This is AMAZING!!! The team's passion seems great.
I'm an aerospace engineer and have two words for you: Liquid. Fuel. And carbon fiber. So actually four words. Produce a fully reusable (presumably 2 stage) LEO launch vehicle with an optimum payload size and put SpaceX out of business. Also you need some Star Trek references in your videos.
I believe that liquid fuel would provide us with better control and enhance the weight-to-thrust efficiency of our propellant. Would we have to make our own motor, or is there a premade brand you would recommend? Implementing carbon fiber would be easy by simply replacing the PLA filament with CF. The only non-reusable part of the rocket is the motor. We're so close! There may or may not be some Star Trek memes in the next video. That being said, putting SpaceX out of business might be a bit more of a challenge 🤣. Thanks for the advice; it's so cool to get feedback from an aerospace engineer!
P.S., there’s a snack compartment above the flight computer for payloads :)
absolutley amazing. you all have a great going.
Great work guys, keep it up. If you want👌
Awesome Sauce! Congratulations guys!
Terrific effort!
Prodigious
What a good rocket!! 🎉
Wow 😮 Hope for more… I would love some slow paced videos, too. BR from Denmark 🇩🇰
I’ll consider making some slower paced videos in the future!
Great video work too
jersey mikes sales 📈
😂
Good job boys🙌👋
Awesome!
this is really cool man the fact this was pulled off, keep up the great work, perhaps this concept could be used for horizontal flight as well, for hyper maneuverability, in a rocket powered plane setting?
We’ll definitely apply TVC to other projects, one thought was to have the rocket launch horizontally off of the top of an RC plane and correct upwards or in a predetermined pattern. If I am understanding your idea correctly, directly powering a plane with TVC’d rocked engines is also a possibility, although we’re going to focus on keeping it in the rocket form factor while we’re still fine tuning it. We just want to steer clear of any kind of “guidance” system, if you know what I mean 😅. Thanks for the words of encouragement!
Yeah no problem, That sounds sick, kinda like a space shuttle air launch or like a cargo plane with it falling out of the payload door or bomb bay, if you do go through with that project please make a video on it. Would love to see that
One more thing, one of the hurdles I see that you may want to account for is the release, if your going to carry the rocket on the top it would effect the carrier planes flight path and may burn the top of the plane but with tv, you could direct the nozzle so it would lessen the blow. So maybe dropping it from the belly depending on altitude, will give you more time to correct the flight path. None the less, it will take a few lines of code 😅 but I’m sure you can make it happen
cool stuff! keep it up 🤙
Just like Elun Mask
This is undervalorated. You deserve more bro ;)
Incredible!!!!
Wow. Subscribed.
next.... make a underground missile silo!.... that looks so much icbm :D
I’ve been wanting to make an underground silo (to launch the rocket out of), thanks for the suggestion! Also it’s a stabilized rocket, not a guided missile. 😅
Dude, this is sick. I definitely wanna see you guys try to aim higher with more cameras. LETS GO TVC!!
Higher + more cameras = even more awesome videos! We’ll definitely aim for that in the future.
Great work! Which motor did you use? Looks like an Estes, but long burn, so E12 maybe?
We used an Estes F15 motor.
Hey Miles, this is from PCBWay. Your work is truly amazing, and we were wondering if there's a chance for us to collaborate.
Hi Luz, I am very interested in collaborating with PCBWay. Could you provide the best email to reach you at? Thanks, Miles.
I can see the mark Rober inspiration
Do you plan to scale it up and shoot for other goals and if so how would you plan to do that since Im assuming it would be a bit harder to gimbal the entire motor if it was that large. All in all thats dope and wish you luck man
We haven’t decided what we want to do next with the rocket, but you have a good point with the upscaling. If we wanted a longer burn time, one solution might be to include multiple deployable stages instead of trying to use a single larger motor. We’re also currently looking into implementing a trapezoidal-PID gradient algorithm and adding a reaction wheel for z-axis stability. Thanks for the words of encouragement!
cool
i'm your 170th
All the best guys how much did the project cost?
Not counting the tools we already had (3d printers, drills, soldering iron, etc), I would say that R and D costed about $400 in lost materials, and a final rocket costs about $50 to make. This doesn’t take into consideration the cost to drive out to the desert 3 times.
MK- TH-cam won't let me reply to your response so I'm posting my reply here, we'll see if it works-
I'm not aware of any hobby scale flight capable liquid propellant rocket engines, maybe check eBay and Amazon but you probably need to make your own. Goddard did it 100 years ago without the internet, though of course he was a physics professor. Solids are generally for military applications and aren't appropriate for man rating. And aerospace CF isn't PLA with CF, it's CF reinforced epoxy. PLA/CF is basically stronger plastic. 3D printing is good for making molds for CF/epoxy, maybe use PLA or PLA/CF for that, or whatever google says. And my comment said reusable LEO launch vehicle. "LEO" means Low Earth Orbit, which you're a fair distance from but you have plenty of time. I'll ponder appropriate Trekisms. And you shouldn't fly an instrumented mouse in the snack compartment and you definitely shouldn't put it on TH-cam.
I'll just stick to PLA for now, it's light/strong enough and prints really well at fast speeds. Achieving Low Earth Orbit sounds pretty hard considering the scale of our rocket, we're only reaching about 120 feet of altitude right now. I would never put a mouse in the rocket, at least not until we have a smooth propulsive landing (JK). Thanks for the feedback again, you're really getting my gears turning. -Miles
did you use rocket candy as fuel?
No, we used an Estes F15 solid motor. Although we definitely would of had more customization options if we made our own rocket candy fuel, reliability was really important to us since the thrust vector control was so sensitive.
Sorry wrong spel
No problem, thanks for the comment!
Awesome!