Building a Rocket

[tycon69]

Me and a friend are considering doing our science fair project on rockets. We were going to try and build one and test it to a reasonable thesis somewhere along the lines of "Which rocket fuel will fly the rocket the furthest", "What rocket design is the most aerodynamic" , etc. But in our innitial brainstorming, we encountered a few problems. Can we actually make this rocket without having to buy anything substantial? We were going to build the body out of a thin aluminum cylinder we found and some other scrap metal, but we encountered a dillema when we realized we would need a motor. We do not want to buy the motor, if possible we want to make it ourselves. Is this possible?

 

Is it possible to instead of including a motor, fill a chamber in the rocket with said fuel and by a burning fuse, ignite the fuel and harness the energy through a hole in the bottom of the rocket?

 

And once we have solved the engine problem, what different kinds of fuels could we test? Alcohol? Black powder? What else?

 

Could someone please help us to figure this out? Keep in mind that we are only high school students so our knowledge is not that extensive. Thx.

[insane_alien]

okay, seeing as you are in highschool, you'll probably want to keep it simple. which means your not going to be playing about with anything combustible enough to make a rocket. especially not a liquid fuel.

 

i think that you would be better going for the water rocket approach and experiment on what gives better performance. like pressure in the bottle and amount of water in the bottle.

 

i don't know your math level but if you have done a bit of calculus it should be fairly easy to derive some of the more simple equations of rocketry as they apply equally to water rockets and saturn V's

 

it may not be as exciting as building a rocket from scratch but it'll be safer for you and not illegal. as long as you do a proper investigation on the thing it should be fine. and remember, its okay if it 'accidentally' falls over on lift off and soaks your teacher

[DrDNA]

You'll put your eye out.

[insane_alien]

try to be helpful DrDNA. there really isn't much cance of that.

 

making rocket fuel is more likely to cause your hands to become separated by several hundred meters.

 

water rockets ... ummm... paper cut from the fins? stub your toe on the foot pump? isn't much dangerous stuff going on there.

[DrDNA]

.....oh yeah. Tell that to my one-eyed friend that has an Estes rocket sticking out of his socket.

[Zaire]

insane's talking about a water rocket.....

[DrDNA]

That may be, but the original posters are playing with fire (rocket fuel).

[eggman]

im getting ready to make a rocket using r candy as fuel. its basically potassium nitrate, sugar, water, iron oxide, and corn syrup boiled down and it burns vigorously and with a lot of thrust

[guy7]

Here is a site by someone who has done some rocket candy experiments, it also has the recipe.

 

http://www.jamesyawn.com/rcandy/index.htm