Booster Section
My Role: I set the overall design, and helped guide my team to design the fin contour. I oversaw the construction and integration of the subsystems.
Design: Airframe made from 0.125“ wall thickness filament wound carbon fiber with an ID of 6.00” with a 98mm ID carbon fiber motor mount with identical wall thickness. Fins were made from 0.25” fiberglass, with centering rings cut from 0.125” thick G-12 fiberglass. Rods running with length of the booster are 1/4-20 threaded aluminum rod with a rated tensile strength of 500lbf. The aftward end of the threaded rod terminated at a 0.25” aluminum plate with a commercial steel motor retention system. The forward end of the rods terminated at cast steel eye-bolts with a rated lifting strength of 2000lbf. These eye-bolts existed as a connecting point for the parachute shock-cord.
Construction: The booster was successfully constructed, but not without significant complications. While I did my best to guide my team in the best direction, the method I chose has some significant issues. The inclusion of threaded rod and mounting nuts on either end of every centering ring was not practical and waisted lots of time, had there been more care in the design phase, the assembly could have been greatly expedited. Secondly, mounting the fins first and passing the airframe over the thrust assembly works much better in CAD then it does in reality. Warping in the airframe due to heating after cutting fin slots and a number of other complications made the assembly process time intensive and produced less than optimal results. I would advise entertaining other design architectures and other methods of assembly.
