January, February and March launches of our USLI rocket Sky Bolt
USLI presentations in December, February and April
Successful rocket launch at USLI event in Huntsville, AL in April

First Nations Rocket Launch Competition in Milwaukee, WI in April where we won 1st place in the launch portion of the American Indian Society of Engineers and Scientists competition

Results of both competitions will be made know to us the latter part of May.

Three members of the rocket team are NASA summer interns, 2 to Haskell for GIS and one to Kennedy Space Center. Gary will be a NASA faculty mentor at Ames Research Center in CA

We are starting to think about next year’s projects.

More and pictures to follow soon.

So, now we are preparing for next year

http://blogs.nwic.edu/rocketteam

The flight competition entails:

Successfully flying a rocket obtaining “inflight-autostability” using an CTI 54mm, J140 motor with a 8.5 second burn. This challenge suggests that as the motor burns propellant, the rocket will be engineered to redistribute weight, rocket forces, or both to autostablize the rocket while inflight. The flight competition will be judged by the output of a competition-provided 3 axis accelerometer.

New This Year:

Aesthetic Award: An award will be given to the team whose rocket has the most innovative and professional appearance. Details that will be looked at include: paint, design, visibility, construction details, & overall “Wow” factor. This award will be voted on by the judges at the time of oral presentations. The winning team will be presented with the “Aesthetic” award at the banquet on Saturday night.

Team Spirit Award: This award will be given by a vote of all competing Tribal College teams to the team that shows interactive spirit, helpfulness, and cooperation. Teams will be encouraged to look at not only how the the other teams interact with each other but also how they interact with other team members, judges and staff. The winning team will be presented with the “Great Spirit” award at the banquet on Saturday night.

Rockets! Rockets? That was a topic of interest for a couple of students, Justin and Robert, while sitting in Gary’s classroom after the day’s classes. “What can we do with our electronics, computer, and robotics knowledge?”, they mused. One of them suggested rockets and an Internet search quickly demonstrated that that would be an expensive route. They persisted and discovered air/water powered rockets. Recycled soda pop bottles, tire pump, a few feet of ½ inch PVC and we’d be in business. 

Justin assembled a launch pad and Gary scouted out the neighborhood recycling bins for 2 liter bottles. A couple of days later we were launching bottles into the air in front of the classroom. Naturally, we attracted a slew of onlookers and well-wishers. We publicized and held weekly launches over the lunch hour that were enthusiastically attended by students as well as the college’s employees 

We quickly realized that there is much more to these rockets than filling with water, pressurizing with air and launching them. Stability, gentle recovery, and re-use ability are key if one wants to do any sort of altitude research, most efficient water/air proportions, amount of air pressure, etc. Did we mention math, materials research, Internet research, aerodynamics, or physics? All of these came into play as we, (by know we added five more students), became more “serious” about how to get them higher and faster. We learned that the current record (2009) for a water/air pressurized rocket is 2,024 feet. Our best altitude to date is 454 feet. We’ve a ways to go! 

One of the Internet websites needed and organizational name as part of the registration process. We decided to register ourselves as the Northwest Indian College Space Center. That’s how we got started; but it was just the beginning!

Our Proposal to NASA for the ESMD Project: MSFC3-27-SD, Spacecraft

Analyze, build, and flight-test rockets to develop systems engineering skills.  A rocket is to be built that will target an exact altitude which lies between 3500 ft and 7500 ft (above ground level).  The target altitude is negotiable, but must be declared at the start of the project, and must be achieved within a band of ± 1%. A trajectory algorithm is to be written to predict  the position, velocity, and acceleration of the rocket from liftoff to touch down. The trajectory algorithm is to be anchored with data from a series of ground and flight tests.  Other pertinent engineering parameters (eg., drag as a function of velocity or time, tank pressure as a function of burn time (for propulsion systems which use fluid propellants), motor chamber pressure, etc.) should also be predicted, measured, and correlated. It is strongly encouraged, but not required, to incorporate an active onboard energy management system into the rocket system to more precisely achieve the target altitude.

was accepted and we were awarded $4000.00 to pursue this project.

The class finished up on 8/12 with many rocket adventures. The culmination was a class built high powered rocket that we launched at our launch facilities. Class and team members also spent some time with the Women, Girls, Men and Boys Conference in Gold Bar, WA with a water bottle build and fly activity with conference participants. We also did a day-long air/paper and water/soda bottle rocket build and launch with 15 high school students from the Summer Science Academy. Great fun was had by all!!

And, last but not least, we’ve had an article about us published by NASA and placed on their website.

More words and pictures to follow.