avionics

some signal testing

buzzer controller for recovery by beeping

exploded view of Wilhelm's cargo bay

ground receiver station with a rather exotic antenna

assembled avionics bay (GPS, accelerometer, altimeter)

the radio telemetry interface

many of the rockets i fly carry electronics on board. these are known as "avionics": they measure data like altitude, speed, and GPS location, and sometimes, they control the rocket in some way. this can include active control, like robotic aerobraking, as well as the electronic triggering of ejection charges and upper stages in more advanced rockets.

for hardware, i am a big fan of Adafruit's Feather line of microcontrollers and sensors. i mostly use Arduino IDE for programming them, but i have experimented with Zephyr RTOS at times for higher performance. i use git for versioning and follow best practices to keep my code readable as projects get more complex.

timeline