AspireSpace: Project Aims

				AspireSpace
				The British Amateur Space / Rocket Programme

ASPIRESPACE AIMS AND OBJECTIVES

ASPIRESPACE AIMS

The intention of the AspireSpace Rocket Programme is, to carry out the design, construction and testing of a series of increasingly powerful rockets, culminating with an attempt to achieve Low Earth Orbit (LEO) at the turn of the century. To that end, our main mission aim is:

"To enable an international amateur developed rocket to reach orbit by the year 2000"

We will continue to develop the philosophy set out during the ASPIRE I project: that simple, reliable cost effective hardware can achieve solid results, and that this application yields its best results when team - that the solutions developed for the ASPIRE Programme should be:

An evolutionary approach to a revolutionary system.

ASPIRESPACE OBJECTIVES

To develop innovative spaceflight technolgies which will enable cheap access to space, e.g. hybrid motors, and off the shelf electronics systems.

To educate AspireSpace members in spaceflight technology through practical experience.

To create and foster international collaboration.

To encourage links between education, commerce and industry as well as between the arts and science.

To act as a channel for reducing the risks associated with innovation.

The activities encompassed by the ASPIRE Programme team will be numerous and varied. Technology development will take place in the areas of airframe and avionics, payload design and in an exciting development from the ASPIRE I project - propulsion system design and implementation. It is intended that all but the initial rockets in the ASPIRE Programme series should make use of an engine based on hybrid rocket technology.

Hybrid engines (based on the principle of a solid propellant and liquid oxidiser) offer an excellent combination of cheapness, environmentally friendliness, very safe usage characteristics and good performance, and hence are extremely suitable for use in a project of this nature.