Portland State Aerospace Society

2008-10-01 - No go on 'Rocktober', student club stuff, meeting days.

Wed, 01 Oct 2008 22:06:01 -0700

No go on the 10/12 launch

Unfortunately, we're just not ready to launch at Oregon Rocketry's "Rocktober" launch event in Brothers, Oregon. So we're putting off the launch until:

We file an FAA waiver and get landowner permission for sometime in November.
We launch to only 1,200' locally just to test the airframe.
the next Oregon Rocketry launch, which is in spring.

Student Club Stuff

'Party in the Park' is tomorrow. Please sign up and help!

Maria says that we need more full time students, so we're going on a campaign to get more students.

SALP has certain constraints with it; we're thinking about possible other funding sources.

Meeting Days

We're thinking about moving our meetings to Tuesday; let us know if that doesn't work for you.

2008-09-01 - More planning on CPAs for LV2c

Tue, 02 Sep 2008 01:20:36 -0700

Maria, Glenn and Frank met at Andrew's house to work on version 4 of the Cylindrical Patch Antennas. Some highlights:

We have enough UHMW PE to build about 5 (5.9, to be precise) patch antennas.
Andrew and Maria added a 5.675 GHz, 16 tap CPA sheet to the worksheet (now complete, by the way).
We discussed how getting it built over the next few weeks.

To be done:

Glenn is going to scan the relevant pages from that antenna reference book.
It'd be nice to have a square, possibly even circularly polarized, series of patch test antennas for characterizing samples of PE: Maybe Glenn can design these?
Maria is going to see if Parks PCB will run our new design. Else, it's off to Sunstone.

2008-08-13 - Switched launch dates, airframe update, and avionics update.

Wed, 13 Aug 2008 21:37:31 -0700

We're looking for an inner SW/SE storage place for rockets. 5x5x15 (or any combination there of) will need. Any one have any ideas?

Part I - Launch date switch

Since some people can't go to the BALLS 2008 launch, and it's coming up soon, we decided to push back two weeks Oregon Rocketry's "Rocketober" event in Brothers, Oregon.

Part II - Airframe update

Went over the Gantt chart from a few weeks ago, tried to coordinate some details for next week. Rocketober will be cutting it close, but we think we can make it.

Part III - Avionics update

We got the Ozark COTS recovery computer in. Frank's going to program it. We'll try to put the camera in, then add a small DVR, then go for wireless, then go for overlay.

Next Week

Look for line cutters this weekend on Sunday.
Bring in the hardware next wednesday to figure out mounting the COTS recovery computer.

2008-08-06 - Nosecone built! With Pics!

Wed, 06 Aug 2008 20:38:37 -0700

Dan finished up the the first nosecone!

It was apparently good enough to fly, but he's going to give it another try to increase fiber content.