This week’s selection is the Propulsive Landing Rocket by JRD Propulsion.
JRD Propulsion is a small venture started by high school student Aryan Kapoor in New Jersey. The goal of the venture is to develop a hobby-level model rocket that can land under its own power, rather than falling with a parachute as is most commonly done.
Propulsive rocket landings are extraordinarily complex — it was achieved only by SpaceX after many years of development. Here, however, we have a student attempting to do the same project, but on a much smaller scale.
The complexity lies in the fact that there must be a second engine onboard to power the landing, and that steering is required at low speeds. This meant that JRD Propulsion had to include a gimbal mechanism to tilt the landing engine for steering. That required significant software development, with thousands of lines of code being written. And all of this must be done within very strict weight constraints.
The project began in 2021 with a series of iterative rocket designs that gradually worked through the problems. Many of the rocket parts were custom designed and 3D printed.
According to the JRD Propulsion website, the venture has undertaken multiple test flights in 2022-24 with several different vehicle designs. Some succeeded, but many failed and generated important learnings.
Recently JRD Propulsion managed to achieve a successful flight and landing, as seen in this video:
While the landing succeeded, it wasn’t a complete success. The lower section, containing the main engine and launch legs did not detach. However, the contraption did manage to land regardless, and that’s the reason for the bounce upon impact.
I suspect that the next test could be even more successful, with a proper landing.
This project required an enormous amount of effort, far beyond any normal model rocketry project. Kapoor’s resume will now have something on it almost no one else has.
Via JRD Propulsion
