Closing competition

The "hot phase" of competition is getting closer and closer. Wednesday is the day when we will get to know the other teams personally, and already on Friday our satellites will start if they pass the inspection on the day before.

The latest preparations are currently under way. Both CanSats are ready to go and meet the guidelines of the competition. The radio path is also stable and the ground station has been programmed.

We will always keep you up-to-date with daily reports. So it is worthwhile to visit our blog more often.

And of course we wish all teams a good flight and nice days!

Brief report about our four radio tests:

We have done four radio tests. Our communication works via WiFi and therefore we need a WiFi adapter for the ground station. The CanSat has an already integrated WiFi module.

The results we got from these tests were interestingly varied.

Twins

Today we finished our work on the second CanSat. It is a replica of the first one. This means we now have a replacement should one of the CanSats not work.

Additional weight for our CanSat

The guidelines require the CanSat to weigh between 300 and 350 grams. Because our CanSat only weighs 220 grams we needed to add at least additional 80 grams of extra weight to reach the minium weight.

We choose to use lead as extra weight again because of its high density and softness, but this time, instead of strapping strips of lead to the batteries with cable ties we choose to melt the lead in the same form our circuit boards are.

By doing so we are able to simply bolt the lead plate onto our CanSat like our circuit boards. The plate will be fixed to the bottom part of our CanSat in order to help stabilize the fall so our CanSat can take some steadier pictures.

mold drying

the materials we used

Further progress of our work on the CanSat

Till now we managed to produce a new and a much better version of our CanSat. And this is how it now looks like:

First progress

The meetings of Jan Philipp and Damian were in order to continue working on a new and a much better version of their CanSat without a radio module. And the results of their work from the 17th to the 20th of May are :

• They were able to save some space for other elements of the CanSat, in which they desoldered some unnecessary or unneeded elements of the Raspberry Pi 3.

These unneeded elements are one of two USB interfaces, the ethernet Interface and some Pins.

•  They also built the orientation module and the camera/sensor module all over again, but the sensors of the camera/sensor module were left the same. However the camera/sensor module has gotten a new PiCam and a new order of its elements (see here).

• The connection between the sensors is now more intelligible, because colored cables were added and the harness cables (wire harnesses )were knotted. 

Finally, no more chaos!

That is it till now, but it is not over yet.

We are back!

Finally, we have finished our exams so we can start working on our CanSat again! 

 

Our present plan foresees that we will keep our secondary mission, but we will improve it! Thus, individual technical components will be replaced. The Pi 2 B will be replaced by a Raspberry Pi 3, so more power is available for our software. As well, the current version (V1.3) of the PiCam will be replaced by the more recent one (V2).
Our basic concept of construction (boards with elements held together by 3mm threaded rods) has proven itself and will be therefore unchanged adopted.
As an innovation, we are currently testing whether we can replace the radio connection by a WLAN connection so that we can save the T-Minus radio module. To capture the signals we want to use a WLAN directional antenna. consequently, we are looking for a non-metallic shell for our CanSat, because our existing aluminum sheath would shield the WLAN.
The recovery unit should also be optimized. So we want to extend the joint between CanSat and the parachute (from 15 cm to> 50 cm) to counteract the pendulum movements during the fall.

That the current competition will take place internationally, so we will continue this blog in English.

More details / information will follow soon.

surprise!

We are very pleased to announce that "Sparkasse Bremen" (a German bank) will support our project with 1800€.
We are very much looking forward to this generous support as part of the "Bremen macht Helden" sponsorship program of Sparkasse Bremen.

How is it going now?

After, or by winning the German CanSat competition, we are qualified for the European level. But what does it mean now? What goals have we set ourselves? The "actual" European CanSat competition 2017 with the rockets launching and presentations will take place in Bremen, Germany from 28.06.17 until 02.07.17. The working time for these intensive days has already begun. There were two interesting candidates: Portugal or Norway. As a result of the competition being "international", we will continue our blog in English . What goals have we set ourselves? We have to do a little fine operations on the hardware as well as on the software. In concrete terms, this means for the hardware, the following: First, that the rate of measurement errors at the sensors has to be minimized or eliminated. Second,  to select and install a new camera (ISO values ​​have to adapt more quickly - further minimize the green hue/tint on our pictures , the shake and the blur). Third, the reliable wireless connection of the CanSats could still be increased (works so far with a reliability of approx. 70%). Fourth, computer has to be changed, because the Raspberry Pi 2 from the RAM is not enough for our program or takes too much time. This is dependent on the improving progress of the software. So it could happen that we have to change our design again.

We have a reason to celebrate !!!

Today, after the very interesting tour of the Airbus, the award ceremony took place. Beforehand is to say that the distance between the teams was very tight.

We are pleased to announce that we have been awarded the 1st place in the German CanSat competition 2016. In doing so, we have qualified for the participation as representatives of Germany in the European competition.

We are all very much looking forward to it and would like to thank our sponsors - "encoway" and our school club -, which have made our success possible.

Our certificate

Evaluation and presentations

Today the presentations of the results of our missions took place. It was very interesting to watch the 10 minute long presentation of each team and to compare our results / conclusions with them.

5, 4, 3, 2,1 - Here we go!

Today was the big day where all satellites ,always two of them in a rocket were allowed to start.The launch took place at the airport Rotenburg (Wümme).

360° panorama from the airfield .Click to enlarge the picture

Impressions of the two first days of the competition

Since monday ,the week of the competition has already started. The opening event took place in Bremen / Germany exactly at ZARM (directly under the Bremer Fallturm/fall tower). And there, we finally had the opportunity to meet the 9 other CanSat teams from all over Germany and also to inspect the fall tower.

Results of sponsoring search

We are very glad to announce that we have found another sponsor next to our school club!

Our new sponsor is the software development company encoway GmbH and we are very grateful for their financial support in the amount of 500 €.

We appreciate it!

Results of sponsoring search

We wanted to let you know that our school’s association will provide us with financial support.
In addition to the already sponsored 100 € entry fee, we have been secured again up to 200 €. We are very happy about this.

Test of the radio link

At our last meeting we tested the radio link between our CanSat and the ground station.

Power Weekend

Interested in what is meant?

Alexander von Humboldt discovered ...

This was the motto of our school festival, which took place on the premises of our school on Thursday, the 1st of September. Of course, we were also represented there with a booth.

Approaching delivery

Now it is time to send our interim report and our design document to the competition. We will also upload the documents to you on our blog.


In the last few weeks, we have familiarized ourselves with the sensors and materials, and now we are feeling it almost "like we are at home".


On this occasion we would like to point out that we are still urgently looking for sponsors for our project. If you are interested, you can find our contact details in the imprint.

Our first press conference

At the meeting last Thursday we had a guest from the “Weserkurier” ( a German newspaper). The reporter asked us about the progress of the competition, about our secondary mission, as well as about the reasons why we participate in the competition. The article will appear in the next few days in the Bremen part of the “Weserkurier”. We will inform you about this again.

The programming of the sensors was successful and the programming of the acceleration sensor was already completed.

We have already written to sponsors but we have not received any positive feedback.

Furthermore, we have made the following plan for the next two weeks:

•  setting up a power supply for the Rapberry Pi (1 or 2)

• developing a first simple image recognition software for testing- sending another letters to sponsors (with a reference to the article in the “Weser Kurier”)