Our rocket can be broken down into individual subsystems.

Here is a short overview of all of them.

Payload (Damping System): HELVETIA’s payload weighs 4kg, and conforms to the CubeSat standard, occupying 3 standard CubeSat units (U). 1U will be used to measure vibrations in the structure. The remaining 2U will be used to implement a damping system and measure vibrations within this damped structure. If successful, this damping system could be implemented in future ARIS missions. a damping system that can be used in future ARIS missions.

Recovery (Two Parachute System): At apogee the Nosecone separates and a drogue parachute deploys, slowing the rocket to 30m/s descent velocity. At 450m AGL the main parachute deploys and slows the rocket down further to a touchdown velocity of 5m/s to prevent damage. The deployment at 450m also prevents the rocket from drifting too far during descent.

Avionics (Flight Computers): In the Avionics section our main flight computer is located. We have a modular stack with PCB slots. The 2 GPS units allow us to locate the rocket after touchdown. The flight computers run the state estimation program, written by the simulations team, which allows us to detect apogee and enables a functional recovery system.

Engine and Tank (Hybrid Rocket Engine): A fully Student Researched and Developed (SRAD) hybrid rocket engine developed by the focus project ASTREA. The engine uses nitrous oxide as the oxidizer, stored at 60Bar in a structural run tank. This oxidizer flows into the combustion chamber where it reacts with the grain to provide 6000N of steady state thrust to HELVETIA.

Structures (Structural Integrity): From the Nosecone down the the boattail every structural element is designed and manufactured by our Structures subteam. This includes all the different fairings, the fins as well as the couplers, holding the rocket together at the section interfaces. This subteam is tasked with FEM analysis during our design phase and then with in-house manufacturing and assembly during the later stages of project HELVETIA.

Ground Station (Mission Control): HELVETIA’S Ground Station consists of senders and recievers that communicate with the rocket via telemetry. Mission critical control signals such as ignition or launch scrap can be sent. It allows for viewing the flight via the onboard livestream cameras as well as reading out flight data live. This is done via telemtry with a downlink of 100kb/s. One of the antennas, seen to the right, is following the rocket automatically and one is manually tracking the rocket, resulting in a redundant system to guarantee the telemetry link to the rocket.