SPEARHEAD

The Spearhead Launch Vehicle was our 2023 Spaceport America Cup competition rocket. It was designed to compete in the 30k COTS Solid Category. Spearhead stood just under 13 feet tall with a 5.2-inch outer diameter and a liftoff weight of 80.1 pounds. It featured a 5:1 Von Karman fiberglass nosecone with an aluminum tip, a payload tube made out of astroquartz, an aluminum avionics coupler, and a carbon fiber motor tube with hexagonal airfoil carbon fiber fins. This single-stage rocket used a Cesaroni O-3400 solid rocket motor with a predicted maximum velocity of 1,752 feet per second.

Spearhead featured six payloads: STRAT, SPEAR, the SRAD Flight Computer Prototype, a camera, an antenna, and a black box. STRAT, or Surface temperature and Analysis Tool, measured the surface temperature of the nosecone and payload aerostructure. SPEAR, or Supersonic Pitot Experiment in Aerial Research, determined the rocket’s airspeed. The SRAD Flight Computer Prototype recorded data for our future SRAD flight computer development.

At the Spaceport America Cup, Spearhead launched on the second launch day. The rocket lifted off and reached an altitude of 25,751 feet. With a successful recovery, we placed 6th in our category, our highest placement in an IREC competition since 2015.