Weekly Update (Patreon)

Regarding the Vector Avionics system - the schematics are complete, and board design will likely be complete by this Wednesday. I got slightly delayed last week after getting an opportunity to take on some more paid video work. The design for the thrust vectoring mount is also underway. I'm quite excited to get the design finished, as the new system completely eliminates the need for manual calibration of the mount's "0-position". This means that launch anomalies like that of Echo TV9 can never happen again; the rocket will perform an auto-calibration at startup and will go into an alarm state if the observed TVC motion isn't satisfactory.

I've yet to get into rebuilding the flight software - still focused on getting the flight computer's build right(or very close to it) on the first print. The process costs money and takes some time to complete, so I need to be meticulous with the design to keep costs down.

The weather in Boston is getting nicer by the day, and winds are remaining generally low! That said, I'll be continuing to keep all vehicles grounded until the Vector system comes online in a week or two. This is a similar case to above; the benefits of putting the work in now, will pay off more powerfully in the long term - allowing for more tests of the Vector system, as well as safer flights for all vehicles.

Last week I also put out a quick update on the BPS YouTube channel discussing the current state of the project - most of the topics covered here are the same, but there are a few nice shots of Relay F2 to my favorite song on "The Martian" soundtrack at the end - I would recommend checking it out: https://youtu.be/LgWA8tbCCAs

As always - feel free to reach out with comments, questions, or anything else, and I'll talk to y'all soon!