Rocket team flies out to D.C.

The Team America Rocketry Challenge (TARC) team, which is a part of the Mechanical Science and Engineering Team (M-SET), placed 61st out of 100 teams at the national TARC competition held in Washington, D.C., on May 14. The team consists of junior Mark Van Aken, sophomores Benjy Yang and Michael Shang and freshman Ivan France.

This year’s TARC challenge consisted of launching a rocket to a target height of 750 feet and stay aloft for 40 to 45 seconds. The rocket also carries an egg that must return unharmed.

Scores are determined by how far off the rocket performs from the goals, with the lowest score being the best.

The team overshot the goal by about 47 feet, which “is not bad for the first time at nationals,” according to Van Aken.

“We were obviously hoping to get first, but the weather [in D.C.] was a huge issue for us,” he said.

Van Aken said it was lightly sprinkling with a steady 10 mph wind and low clouds at nationals, which the team had never practiced in.

He said that even the slightest amount of rain would cancel practice launches. The team practices at NASA Ames and at Snow Ranch, a farm area, hosted by the Livermore Unit of the National Association of Rocketry (LUNAR).

“We were restricted to those two areas because you need a 1000ft diameter treeless area to fly,” Van Aken said. “LUNAR would cancel when the weather seemed even remotely poor.”

Because of their unfamiliarity with the conditions, the team was left to hope for the best with their current configuration, Shang said.

“I believe we could have done much better if we were more familiar with the conditions and prepared ahead of time,” he said.

In addition, the team decided to remove some weight at the last moment before their only official launch.

“For some reason, our rocket weighed more at D.C. than here in California despite not changing anything,” Van Aken said. “We removed a bit of weight to compensate.”

The team believes that if they did not make that change, they would have placed in the top 20.

“We were disappointed by the results, but at the same time, excited to just be [in D.C.],” Shang said.

Overall, the TARC team was very pleased with their first national performance. For next year, they plan to improve by adopting a more scientific approach to their practice launches.

“We are going to write down everything we can about the conditions at a particular launch so we can analyze if certain ones do affect our rocket performance,” Van Aken said. “That way we can properly react to weather changes.”

Shang said the experience was very valuable.

“We learned how to work as a team and adjusting to whatever that is thrown at us,” Shang said.

For any potential new members, Shang said with a smile, “If you like loud sounds, then join TARC.”