GASP Project: Sounding Rocket Development (Part 1)

This is the next part in a series on the Great Galactic Space Gimmick’s GASP initiative Sounding Rocket Project, written by UCCS students Cindy Judd, Austin Galley, and myself (Ben Faltinowski).

DISCLAIMER: This project is done on a voluntary basis without financial compensation and this rocket will not be marketed to the consumer public now or in the future.

PURPOSE: The purpose of this post is to demonstrate what goes into systems engineering of a space-intent rocket launch vehicle and to promote learning and involvement in STEM science. Those who want to develop similar projects are welcome to review this project as guidance granted that they make the effort to do their own design work and analysis and not just duplicate this work verbatim.

• CONOPS DOCUMENTATION: The following link connects to the Sounding Rocket’s Concept of Operations (or CONOPS) documentation compiled for this Capstone project.  The purpose of this document is to describe in detail the Sounding Rocket’s full operational concept from prelaunch, launch, flight, and recovery as well as detail the payloads intended to fly on behalf of Kino Junior High School of Mesa, AZ.

• • The GASP Initiative Sounding Rocket (please click the link below for the CONOPS document).

CONOP-01 – Rocket Concept of Operations

• SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS: The next document is the Requirements derived for the Sounding Rocket Project.  This covers the derived requirements needed for a detailed design of the Sounding Rocket and is used for later stages of design and conforms to the previously cited CONOPS:

• • The Sounding Rocket’s subsystem and requirements (please click the links below for System Requirements).

SSD-02 System Specification Document – Sounding Rocket – CDR Final

• MODEL-BASED SYSTEMS ENGINEERING DIAGRAMS: The next document is an overview of the MBSE models generated in accordance with the CONOPS and System Requirements.  The MBSE modeling software used for the design was Gaphor. The purpose of this is to model the full Sounding Rocket system and look for design features and specifications requiring further definition:

• • Excerpt of MBSE Model of System (please click the link below for Overview of MBSE model of Sounding Rocket).

MBSE Model Overview Document

• CRITICAL DESIGN REVIEW: Finally, the following documents are support documents for this project which include Master Timing, Risk Mitigation, and the Critical Design Review presentation (given in May 2022):

Please click the links below for Master Timing, Risk Mitigation, and CDR Charts.

Project Plan – Master Timing

Project Risk and Mitigation Plan

Sounding Rocket – Critical Design Review – Final

The next article will cover the physical design of the rocket which takes into account all presented documentation linked in this post. Also, the physical construction, launch preparation, and flight will be covered in future articles soon.

For the Great Galactic Space Gimmick, I’m Gimmick Commander Ben Faltinowski, coauthors Cindy Judd, Austin Galley, and The Great Galactic Space Gimmick 🙂

© Ben Faltinowski, Cindy Judd, Austin Galley, and The Great Galactic Space Gimmick, 2022. Authorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this site’s author and other authors cited in this post and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Ben Faltinowski, The Great Galactic Space Gimmick, and other authors cited herein with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.