Avionics & Recovery division
Avionics & Recovery
One subteam with two halves that work hand in hand: Avionics builds the rocket’s electronics, and Recovery designs the parachutes those electronics deploy.
Where it lives on the rocket
- Avionics and recovery: main parachute, avionics bay, and drogue parachute (approximate position) — Avionics & Recovery
Drawn to scale from the 2025–26 rocket. Nose cone, airframe, and fins come from its 3D model; the internal sections show the usual layout of a dual-deploy rocket, not measured positions.
Avionics
The rocket's nervous system: flight computers, sensors, telemetry, power distribution, and the electronics that fire recovery events. Members design circuit boards, write embedded code, and test it on the bench before it ever flies.
What Avionics does
- Sensors, flight computers, and telemetry systems
- Power distribution and deployment electronics
- Real-time flight data for payload operation and recovery
Not part of Avionics
- Sizing, packing, and testing the parachutes (Recovery)
- The payload's own electronics and code (Payload Electronics and Payload Software)
What you'll work on
- Flight computer integration
- Sensor networks
- Telemetry systems
- Power management
- Data acquisition systems
- Recovery electronics
Skills you'll build
- PCB design
- Embedded programming
- Sensor integration
- Electrical testing
- Data systems engineering
Who leads Avionics in 2026–27
Recovery
Recovery brings the rocket and payload home safely with a dual-deployment system: a drogue parachute, then a main parachute. It's one of the most safety-critical jobs on the team and a real introduction to reliability engineering.
What Recovery does
- Dual-deployment recovery with drogue and main parachutes
- Deployment mechanisms that work reliably under extreme conditions
- Descent-rate, black-powder charge, and shear-pin calculations; deployment sequencing
Not part of Recovery
- Designing the flight computers that fire the charges (Avionics)
- Building the airframe and couplers around the parachute bays (Structures)
What you'll work on
- Drogue deployment systems
- Main parachute systems
- Avionics bay integration
- Black powder testing
- Recovery validation campaigns
- Flight readiness verification
Skills you'll build
- Recovery system design
- Reliability engineering
- Flight testing
- Data analysis
- Systems validation
Who leads Recovery in 2026–27
Interested in avionics & recovery?
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