Hovering a rocket - SpaceX model

[@williamosman]

It's a Success!!!!

[@paulleifert]

William Osman Nice to see you here (:

[@Oskarbo97]

Hey bro

[@nokbeen3654]

William Osman love your vids bro :P

[@samiant5199]

it William where the beeeeeeesssss

[@ethanhamto2405]

Ey!

[@jjbailey01]

Perhaps market this as a radio controlled, flying leaf blower.

[@iawindowss4061]

hahaha yes

[@iawindowss4061]

on kick starter

[@TREmreprogaming]

xD

[@Hotshot_Bagger]

Hell I'd buy one, just slap an fpv cam and vtx on the bottom and I can blow leaves from the comfort of my couch

[@vast634]

I would call it the "neighbors cat chaser 2000"

[@tylergarza8695]

12:06 Lets take a minute to appreciate the magnificent lawn on the left there. I want to hug it.

[@simounrussellofredo504]

YES

[@ScenicBigPlay]

1 year later people start replying to this

[@RichardNutman]

It's all the rain we get :)

[@kalax12a]

@@ScenicBigPlay yes

[@weirdo8103]

@@ScenicBigPlay lol

[@TDensmores]

You are my favorite youtuber, when i grow up i want to be like you.

[@Bill_H]

I really enjoy watching your projects, Tom Stanton. As a fellow ginger, I feel a cameraderie with you. Also, a former aircraft mechanic, and military historian!

[@InnovateParkour]

just saying, if you were to take this into an indoor facility it would work sooo much better and i, personally, would love to see this thing work because the fact that you did what some people thought would be impossible less than 5 years ago just on a smaller scale. very impressed and love watching your videos, cant wait to see what you do next

[@Michael-sb3lg]

Really cool build, you should try flying it in an indoor space somewhere where the wind won't make it drift. I bet it would hover perfectly.

[@michaeltaylors2456]

Michael Ratzke good thing there is never any wind over the ocean

[@nixietubes]

+Michael Taylors You're kidding right?

[@michaeltaylors2456]

Tntmod54321. I’m kidding about the lack of wind over the ocean . I’m commenting on the unintentional debunking of Elon’s show . The well meaning and very intelligent author of this video demonstrated the inherent lack of lateral control a craft like this would have . Gusts present over the ocean would be more than a match for some squirts of nitrogen and wiggling fly swatters ( grid fins ) could ever compensate for. All spaceX launches, tests , recovery all blatantly CGI. A thing may launch from KSC, but the rest is about as believable as the FX in the Last Starfighter

[@Drachenhebron]

rofl, just because he didnt have position control on the control board doesnt mean it doesnt exist., gps, ultrasonics, more accelerators and altitude sensors etc can be incorporated to aid in heading hold, also a larger object has more mass vs surface area and is less effected by wind and inherently more stable because of it.

[@misterbert9246]

Michael Taylors not all the rockets land on the water so you could actually see a landing... also the larger rockets are not effected by the wind as much as smaller rockets

[@teefkay5814]

Tom, Good effort. You learned a lot. But mostly, you've learned what NOT to do. Your first model was far, far superior than your second. You could have saved yourself a boatload of effort by spending a small amount of time talking to someone who knows the engineering. Specifically a control systems engineer. Just as soon as you moved all the weight to the top of the rocket, you doomed your project. With the weight at the top, your rocket is inherently unstable & (virtually) guaranteed to fall over every time it attempts to land. Plus, your rocket model is now completely non-representative of a real F9 first stage. Over 90% of the weight of the first stage is fuel. When the 1st stage is re-entering & landing, it has almost empty fuel tanks & is basically a hollow tube, with 98% (or so) of the weight (the rocket engines) at the very bottom. I've heard a SpaceX engineer describe it as a brick glued to the bottom of an empty aluminum can. This mass orientation gives the 1st stage inherent stability when it is falling in an engine-down orientation. This is also the reason that this whole approach is feasible in the first place. The grid fins do not work by adding mass up high, but rather by simply diverting air, just as ailerons (not "flaps") do on an airplane's wings. Or your hand, when you stick it out the window of a car & tilt it. The big picture that you are lacking knowledge of the huge engineering field called "control systems". The entire process of landing an F9 is, at its heart, one giant exercise in a hugely complex control system. The whole field is a pretty complex one, involving instruments to measure the desired controlled parameters (PLUS their time derivatives & time integrations), actuators, feedback loops, amplifications (aka "gains") & stability. To get it to really work (& to understand why it does or doesn't) in the absence of wind, you'll need what are called PID (Proportional + Integral + Derivative) controllers on each of about 3 parameters: 2 pitch axes & altitude. You can get descent rate from time derivative of altitude. Your video showed that it's pretty difficult to control descent rate in an "open loop" manner without getting pogo instability. In the presence of wind, as the real F9 must operate, you'd need to measure two axes of drift across the ground. The real system undoubtedly uses multiple (probably 4) radio beacons on the outside corners of the barge or landing pad. Now the rocket will have to pitch in order to negate the wind drift, greatly complicating the whole system. Yup, it's rocket science. It's complicated. I'd recommend that, if you decide to re-do this experiment, you should move it indoors, say at a local gymnasium, which will simplify thing immensely. You need to find a helpful control systems engineer and talk to him/her to get a general over-view, especially the difference between "closed loop systems" & "open loop systems". Don't take anything that I've said as perjorative or discouraging. You've done exactly the right thing: built hardware to try to make your idea into reality. You've followed the path blazed by 1000s of engineers before you, going all the way back to the Wright Brothers (& their canard wings) trying to get airplane to fly stably. You've been struggling with exactly the same problems that all those engineers fought. The lesson is ... CHEAT.!! Use everything that those engineers who preceded you figured out. (It ain't really cheating. It's learning & applying.) The most important lessons are: 1. In order to really understand something, you've got to understand the underlying theory. 2. Theory ain't enough. "Just build it", like you did. You'll learn 100x more by trying & failing than you ever will if you stop at (or get intimidated by) theory alone. Best of luck.

[@charliebogaerts7725]

I'm quite sure he didn't 'doom' his project by moving the center of mass to the top for the second model. For hovering, this reduces the effect that you have to steer the engine to the right in order to go to the left, and vice verse, if that makes sense. Furthermore he says he is already using and tuning negative feedback controller. This can also clearly be seen at the end of the video, where he managed really well to get the rocket to fly stable. Really cool project!

[@a914freak]

I wouldn't say he doomed it either but I would have done a lot more experimentation with A)the amount of weight and B)location. and kept the original 6 engine setup. IMO he gave up too quickly on the first design.

[@ZebraFacts]

I believe for the sake of entertainment, by not talking to people that are in the know before working through it the way he did, allowed us to learn first hand with him probably what the experts learned as they went through trial and error. Much the way "Mythbusters" often did their reenactments. For me, both of his models were only modified RC drone, but with that in mind I would have loved to see more effort put into the first one.

[@crazyjay7676]

I think he needs a woman in his life 😆

[@ZebraFacts]

I believe he said "my wife" a few times either in this video or other videos he has made.

[@wyattb3138]

Hey it’s a good time to use Machine learning... leave the thing calibrate itself overnight

[@Ricky32908]

*Wyatt B* , would probably just take a few minutes

[@aayushpanda9]

Mehhh, not required

[@sucim]

I thought the same, using PILCO for example he would only need to build a couple of these, it should get to a good policy in a couple of trials, trashing the whole thing :D

[@BJCaasenbrood]

Or just use an inverted pendulum controller, you don't need machine learning for a simple stabilizer. It's (probably) inefficient and less intuitive. That's why they don't use machine learning in space flights...

[@wyattb3138]

[Brn], for sure. I thought ML would make stuff easier but just simple Algebra is just enough.

[@saulopalacio6157]

NIIIICE 21:19 that tree!!! beautiful!

[@Wingman77tws]

Looks like it was working great.

[@letsgocamping88]

Carl Groover he's pretty damn good with 3D helis.

[@Anvilshock]

It's only a failure if you failed to learn anything.

[@samueljames9342]

I would love to have this guy as a neighbor, just to watch. Great videos my friend

[@iXmerof]

Finally someone who explains things, not just shows SpaceX progress, thank you!

[@ryanm.191]

At least it crashes like real life

[@Mike-gr2ok]

Too right 👍

[@drabberfrog]

Most of the time they don't crash

[@bayramalibostanc9812]

@@drabberfrog r/wooosh

[@drabberfrog]

@@bayramalibostanc9812wtf is a r/wooosh? Lol

[@Chmicken.]

@@drabberfrog it would be ‘an r/wooosh’ instead of ‘a r/wooosh’ because r is pronounced as are on its own and that starts with a vowel rather than a consonant. Also r/wooosh is a subreddit

[@redbeardaroundtheworld3222]

Honestly Tom, i love your approach, your humor and your commitment! You keep testing where I would give up... Thats good for 2 reasons: You get the results and I can benefit from that. Love your work!

[@Ashs290]

Honestly, Didn’t expect to hear a British accent when I first clicked on this video. I absolutely love what spaceX and nasa are doing and really feel left out here in UK. Wish we had a proper space programme so I could really get involved in space exploration.

[@stormm787]

You mean us Yanks know more about British rocketry than you natives? Check these out: kzbin.info/www/bejne/hnSXYqmYhrCZmc0 and kzbin.info/www/bejne/fHmleHSvfrprftk and let's not forget one of my favorite KZbinrs - Scott Manley. I know he is a Scot but isn't Scotland a part of the UK?

[@Jan-cz4ez]

The esa is a decent European space agency

[@Ashs290]

fish not as good as SpaceX though

[@Jan-cz4ez]

@@Ashs290 Definately not

[@Ashs290]

fish I think ESA is just a completely different org compared to SpaceX not necessarily worse. Just different and more subtle in its approach. I think the way that spaceX is building starship with almost like a test and learn mentality you would normally use in software development is really refreshing and is sure to accelerate development. I presume ESA runs things in a more waterfall fashion so takes a lot of research and time before you see anything from them. Both ways have their merits I prefer the quick fail and learn method.

[@DrTeddyMMM]

That was a fantastic effort and proof of concept for using thrust vectoring and ducted fan power! Awesome! Continue your fine work!

[@Pocketpatriot]

I’m literally hooked on your channel mate

[@crankmagician78]

same

[@kennyduthie8264]

Dude...with this, you are a prime candidate for applying for SpaceX and other space companies. You better put this video on your resume and mention it in interviews!!

[@CreativeProductionzz]

It's very interesting project I wish to see more of it, try lunching it from a wooden platform next time

[@TomStantonEngineering]

Yes a wooden platform would allow it to slide a bit and not get the legs caught in the grass! Thanks!

[@collarge]

And then land it on a Model barge on the duck pond.

[@Jack-Cabinetry]

Yea, like a picnic table!

[@Variety_Pack]

Hmmmm, lunch

[@yourhandlehere1]

What's the best wine to have with rocket? Is it better with beer?

[@alasdair4161]

Excellent stuff again Tom, you have however just created the first prototype automated leaf blower of the future.. you need to get patents in place. Seriously though, that is a monumental achievement, the holy grail of rocketry is control, your design just leaped over the first hundred years of 'rocket science'. Great work.

[@letsgocamping88]

Alasdair McC and all with a circuit board costing about £20. Imagine if the rocketing pioneers had what we had.

[@Bluswede]

Actually, the vanes in the airstream vector the thrust exactly as the vanes in the rocket exhaust of the German V-2 rockets of World War Two. Damned good thing that Von Braun DIDN'T have that circuit board!

[@fromagefrizzbizz9377]

+Blusewede that circuit board would have to have had GPS to make that much of a difference. The V2 had at least 2 gyros for lateral guidance (roughly equivalent to what Tom was doing), tho some later ones relied on a ground-sourced radio beam guidance, and usually a timer for engine shutoff. At the distances they were flying, lateral accuracy wasn't that big a deal, distance was more of a problem. GPS would have allowed them to home in on a specific spot. But of course GPS didn't exist then, and if it did, it would have been jammed (or turned off - GPS ground control can literally shut it off at a whim).

[@letsgocamping88]

Fromage Frizzbizz gps has limits built in to it to prevent it being used on rockets, it has a upper speed limit and altitude limit.

[@alasdair4161]

Benjamin Harvey it also has special features that make people drive their cars into the ocean.. but good point on the speed limitations.. much to kim jongs annoyance.

[@LandNfan]

It looks like your thrust vectoring is effective until one gear leg touches down, at which time the correction for the motor torque is thrown off. I’ll bet the solution will be found in a return to the counter-rotating fans, combined with your thrust vectoring. Have you considered using a pair of accelerometers like those found in cell phones? One at the top of the tube and one at the bottom. Your guidance program could compare the inputs to assist in attitude stability and one could also be referenced for position over the ground stability. It would be cool if that could all be programmed into an on-board processor like an Arduino, making your “rocket” nearly autonomous.

[@bitshuffler]

Tom's using a flight controller from a quadcopter / drone that he's written custom code for. This has accelerometers and an in built compass and is running on a chip that's much faster than the arduino.

[@dgdanielgoldman]

arduino has fast chips nowadays. You could also compare the results of top and bottom sensors. Ilike where Norman is heading with this.

[@SashaNaronin]

He already knows angular velocities of that thing. Touchdown detection is always done using physical switches in landing legs/landing gear, both in all rockets and in airplanes. There are also other ways, such as analyzing vertical velocity and throttle level. But for all that he'll need to work on the code a lot. I also suspect he based his code on Cleanflight software for simple multirotors that runs on STM32 ARM-based chip. Simpler version of what we all have in our phones. :) If he were to base it on Ardupilot it would produce better results because that code has way better algorithms to base on. For example, it determines position the way real vehicles do, by fusing together accelerometer, GPS and barometer data. Btw, thank you Tom, you've inspired me to continue tinkering with my Python code for optimizing trajectories and controlling a rocket in KSP.

[@olympiclinic]

Did you work for NASA?

[@LandNfan]

olympiclinic, no, just a life-long interest in aerospace and engineering principles.

[@anuarrahimin7426]

The best amateur Rocket explanation video on KZbin

[@rigilchrist]

Well done. I'm bewildered why anyone would give you a thumbs-down for your efforts - ignore them!

[@3DPrintEverything]

Today we found out why space x doesn't land nor take off on GRASS

[@redsquirrelftw]

I kinda want to see SpaceX land a rocket in a football field now. They probably could do it too.

[@3DPrintEverything]

Red Squirrel yes they could but that's because there a multi billion dollar company who can do what ever they feel like but a small rocket that can be blown over by a gust of wind should have a stable landing and take off not just a mound of grass

[@fromagefrizzbizz9377]

+3D Print Everything With considerable extra effort, this could be developed further and be able to land just about anywhere. But not with hand-made styrofoam tube, cardboard fins, and an electric propeller. He's got the technology down pretty solid. Justs needs a lot of further refinement (if he's interested in doing so).

[@Bones12321]

SpaceX is FAKE Pull your heads out

[@bazzacipher]

Jacob Kneeland Yeah! Why is your head in the ground! Apple is fake too! They cheat us of our money by taking away both the home button and headphone jack!😆

[@scellowmcineka4087]

Yeah it was definite success. Bro you're a genius, true, you should be working a spacex. Also, remember its more difficult to hover any flying machine than to just fly off. Try indoors next time, we understand. Very well done, congrats...!

[@taitywaity1836]

Tom, you should've come to Manchester for uni. We have a society where we're attempting to build a 2 stage rocket where the 1st stage will land itself after deploying the 2nd. We will use a hybrid rocket and probably thrust vectoring similar to your attempt.

[@nicodemusunderkoffer7422]

I'm 14 and doing this myself. Quick question though, how the heck do you keep your rockets fuel from burning up on the way back down? Seriously. I never have enough by the time the flight controls started the oxidizer flow.

[@BillySugger1965]

Nicodemus Underkoffer if I understand your problem correctly, it is similar to landing the Apollo LEM on the moon. A very difficult problem to solve without calculus and a radar altimeter. I think you must allow gravity to start the journey down with minimum thrust, then at the correct time use maximum thrust calculated to stop the rocket just as it reaches the ground. Without a controller knowing height and speed, it is difficult to understand how a controller can do this.

[@BillySugger1965]

Nicodemus Underkoffer Ah, perhaps I misunderstood your problem. You mean the fuel grain continues to burn during unpowered flight because of oxygen from the air? That is a problem with a hybrid engine. Is your rocket big enough to include a small CO2 system to purge the fuel after the boost phase has ended? Like a small fire extinguisher. Then the problem will be how to ignite the engine again for landing.

[@StandWithRussia]

Definitely a success there mate.

[@enoz.j3506]

Great work,i like your patience,never give up attitude,this will always take you far,well done.

[@peterwoo2489]

Great! I was thinking of building an RC Falcon 9. You should try using EDF motors.

[@Side85Winder]

4x EDF motor setup in a rocket booster looking setup would be much simpler although a 4x edf boosters would just turn it into a quad copter with a rocket looking frame i guess you would call that cheating or not in the spirit of the SpaceX design. The single motor design stabilization is fantastic feat of programming and skill very impressive. Maybe counter rotating EDF motors for more thrust? (i don't even know how this increases thrust but good luck!)

[@harishhp137]

I'm not going in that for Mars that's for sure! jokes aside, you did absolutely fantastic job.

[@GenoLoma]

"It won't produce smoke and flames and sound really cool , but for this project it will do exactly the same thing as a rocket will do.. So, errh, deal with it".. lol.. dude for the "deal with it" line you get a thumbs up from me.. and we're only 3 and half minutes in.. :)

[@mojoomla]

It is a grand success Prof. Stanton ! You taught us almost everything about the actual SpaceX Falcon in the process. Bravo and Thanks !

[@donmcelfresh6678]

You succeeded in getting it to hover and that in and of itself was a huge success. As Edison once told a reporter about the light bulb, he found 10,000 different ways it did not work. Good job, good video & explaining everything. 👍

[@usertogo]

You could land on a steel plate and use electromagnetic lockdown to prevent tipping over. Also if you program automatic max descent velocity landing would become safer. Great work!

[@hansdietrich83]

usertogo the flight controller cant sense the velocity just the angle of the rocket

[@vistaero]

In fact, there's no thing in the whole universe that can sense its velocity. You just assume it. He could add an accelerometer to keep track of the accelerations of the rocket and calculate the velocity vector that it should have. Doing this, the rocket could even counteract the force of the wind. I really expect a second part adding an accelerometer and some machine learning to make the flight controller learn by itself how to take off, hover, counteract wind, move to some place and do a soft landing. And an engine that does not overheat! Someone said that an EDF motor is the way to go.

[@hansdietrich83]

vistaero these 8 bit processors are a bit weak for mashine learning

[@usertogo]

vistaero are you taking in Einsteinian relativity terms? - I was taking about acceleration measured obviously - bad signal to noise ratio? Augmentation with camera data comes to mind...

[@vistaero]

usertogo I know, I was replying to hansdietrich83. He said that the flight controller can't sense the velocity. Well, just make it to be able to measure it. Of course the hardware needs a lot of improving. hansdietrich83 Then just run the learning engine in the laptop. Instead of him tweaking the parameters manually and loading the new code to the rocket, the computer would automatically generate the new parameters. It will probably take a little more time to learn to fly, but eventually it should fly better than with any human-made code. Maybe it would be a good idea to practice in a computer simulation.

[@diegushio91]

can you imagine Elons and his engineers satisfaction feeling when their first rocket landed?

[@FreeStuffPlease]

A bunch of relief that they will still have jobs.

[@GrandpaSStudio]

I sense next viral video. Awesome job Tom

[@TomStantonEngineering]

Haha possibly ;) Thanks!

[@littlestworkshop]

Especially if painted pink.

[@YBSTV_Official]

It's already going viral, unilad brought me here 😂

[@iskoos]

You are a very bright and intelligent man Tom. This is an excellent project and to me a pure success. Success is when you are able to do what you designed. And you did it.

[@TechNed]

Nice work. I really enjoyed that. It was cool seeing your 3D printer working away while you fabricated manually and the servo actuator fins looked really functional. I'd call it a success. There are people who spend their entire professional lives on control theory. It's a fascinating subject.

[@TechNed]

PS. Liked & subbed.

[@joecard8]

I loved watching your thought process through each failure and how in each scene you could see your progression to success!

[@danlindy9670]

Next step: Add positioning input? Your inventive use of internal propellers would allow for a small camera mounted on the bottom which can provide the internal computer (switch to Adruino?) with an image of a rectangle, such as a painted piece of plywood acting as the launchpad. The relative lengths of the sides of the rectangle might then inform the lateral thrusters at the top of the rocket, and the area of the rectangle would provide the altitude for main thruster adjustments to acheive automatic ascent and landing. Might even work in the wind!

[@saber1epee0]

Dan Lindy +

[@juliusfucik4011]

That's a nice idea but that is not going to work very well, mostly because a camera produces way more data per second than an Arduino can handle. Also, you would have to calibrate the camera and you would always be stuck with your reference object. Another solution: You could use an IMU with an Arduino. They are quite noisy so you will not have perfect positioning and you will need to initialise the sensor for a second or two and then integrate the data over a certain period of time to get decent velocity estimates. You would have to combine it with GPS and implement some extended Kalman filter in software to get an optimal estimate of the position which you can then use to predict control signals. The greatest feature of such a setup is that the filter adapts itself (even dynamically) to wind, lower battery power, wear and tear on the motor et cetera and will still try its very best to maintain the desired system state (position and orientation of the rocket). Been there, done that. Fun stuff!

[@alexander_richter]

So its a drone in the shape of a rocket?

[@schedarr]

You actually did very well. Congratz!

[@ProCreateful]

Great video man, this is what youtube is all about

[@SterremanWillie]

Well done! You are roughly at Grasshopper stage!

[@lucywucyyy]

give him a few years and he will be at the shitposting about anime phase

[@boris5448]

Hey tom stanton, amazing video! You said that you have 2 rocket engine types: solid and liquid fuel engines. But there is another one: hybrid rocket engine, it has sort of the same advantages of a liquid fuel engine but waaaaaay cheaper! As fuel you can even use 3d print plastic and as oxidizer nitrous oxide or something else. I hope you can do something with this information, maybe for next video?

[@TomStantonEngineering]

Hey Boris, oh yeah I forgot about hybrid rocket engines!! You've reminded me of the old Mythbusters episode about testing different rocket 'fuels'! Think I'll stick to some sort of ducted fan thrust for now as it's slightly less of an issue if it crashes, but maybe something to explore in the distant future, thanks!

[@XcAhMpWnEr]

I feel like hybrids have the disadvantages of liquids, not advantages. You still need high pressures, the burning process isn't as clean and predictable, it's not as efficient, and it's much harder to gimbal. The only thing is that it is safer, but just stand back! There's a reason no actual orbital rockets use hybrids.

[@joshuahellerick321]

He said two *main* types. A hybrid rocket is a combination of both, so not mentioning hybrid rocket motors was a totally okay thing to do, and discussing them wouldn't really add anything to the video, since that would be a bit off-topic.

[@boris5448]

haha that episode was amazing, and I fully understand why you used a ducted fan, it's a little bit easier! I am making a rocket myself and am thinking about making this function too

[@johnnyllooddte3415]

thus the word HYBRID..a cross between the two types duhhhh

[@groundzonepilot7536]

I admire your videos very much! Congratulations on achieving stable hover, that was no easy task. Keep up the good work friend!

[@chriskaprys]

So, completely, impressive. Well done, sir.

[@Trifvas]

That was cool man, your one step closer to success.

[@robertlangley258]

SUCCESS!! You are one intelligent young man, my hat is off to you son. NASA could use you lol, seriously you can work pretty much anywhere you want in the future. It would have been a lot of fun living next door and growing up under your tutelage with your natural abilities of knowledge, experimentation and can-do earnestness.. I am very impressed with what you accomplished here. I’m definitely signed on and look forward to watching you grow and learn along with you. Right-on young man and cheers. Excellent video, narration and explanations. 👍👍👍👍👍

[@donmcelfresh6678]

I agree and if he had the money I'm sure he could build a real working model of the falcon 9

[@rskrks]

Theres some brown stuff on your nose

[@Pokornz]

I love what you do! I don't know if you tweaked the Betaflight mixer and other values, or if you rewrote the code and compiled it, but if you want to continue on this, it might be better to use Arduino and additional sensors (gyro+acc) and write yourself an inverted pendulum controller :). Keep up the great work!

[@ianclews8556]

right or wrong its just so nice to see positive feedback and advice , the world could learn a lot from this alone

[@martindinner3621]

You missed a third fuel type: Hybrid. The basic version of this uses a solid fuel with a liquid oxidizer.

[@d.thieud.1056]

Yea, then you just spray the oxidiser at the solid fuel, and only as much fuel can ignight as is you provide enough oxygen for

[@frankfreeman1444]

Progress, which you made in abundance, equals success. Great job!

[@doldrums8084]

Yo for real tho that is pretty cool to watch. Love me some working models and miniatures. Keep it up!

[@baccarah7010]

imagine elon making a request to get one built to scale to you would be a massive honor

[@Swagaito_Gai]

Title: Hovering a rocket Video: Hovering a long helicopter

[@nathanielpillar8012]

You need some sort of reaction wheel in it, or movable weights, and sensors to detect the orientation and movement. So that it can automatically keep itself upright.

[@minetubequest]

it does keep itself upright but itsnt strong enough the thing is called a "flight controller"

[@catatonicbug7522]

Love the thrust vectoring solution! I kept waiting for that tree to come alive and swat the rocket out of the air!

[@rossathome]

great showing how complex the thrust vectoring is on a budget but can be done , love it

[@websitesthatneedanem]

15:49 - AWESOME Success!!!!

[@TomStantonEngineering]

Haha thrust vectoring does look awesome ;)

[@fromagefrizzbizz9377]

+Tom Stanton Accomplishing it at this scale is pretty awesome. I finally found the amateur rocket version of your "flight": kzbin.info/www/bejne/j5fae2qviKaBoKM This is Blue Origin's version: (the takeoff and landing are real, the middle part is, of course, CGI'd promotional video ;-) kzbin.info/www/bejne/b6HMnZ-XhN16edE

[@thepianoaddict]

I'd call it a success.

[@brainisfullofnonsense8183]

Fantastic project and unbelievable progress. Now I understand why one of my long time friends (and fellow engineer) supports your patron account. To consistently not tip on landing will require a local wind speed and wind direction measurement so that an anti-drift coefficient can be applied to the inputs. That sounds like you will need a portable weather station, which would not be a big deal for a larger scale (and larger budget ) project, but may be beyond your current budget limitations. I may have one I can send you if you would like. To apply that input to the vehicle will require a directional lock on the Z-axis (N., E., S., and W. around the vertical axis), traditionally called yaw, but could be called roll since the nose is pointed up. It depends on if you want to change the terminology based on which flight mode it is in. This yaw lock is available on some drones in the form of control that is referred to as 'headless mode' . Once you have those two elements you can touchdown with a near zero differential x and y velocity with respect to the ground (not sliding). That leaves touchdown occuring with the rocket tilted into the wind, so the landing conditions would again be limited to the same wind velocity values as takeoff...It has to stay standing in the wind. Another thought to give a wider margin for successful landings is drop the center of mass down as much as you can upon first contact with the ground. Perhaps having the batteries drop down (not ejecting the mass, but moving it down) most of the tube would do the trick ; ) Believe it or not, the height of the grass effected your landings. It applied a frictional force that was both immediate (grass is 'grabby'), and not uniform. I think you saw that on takeoff because the video shows that you modified your techniques so you 'jump' into the air. Transitions are dangerous and the time spent in those transitions should be minimized. So, just like you "jump" into the air to takeoff, you shoild "drop" to the ground on landings. During the transitions from ground-to-air , the desirable location of the center of mass reverses completely. On the ground you want it low so that it does not tip and in the air you want to be as high as you can so that you can tip it using the vectored thrust. It could have a ground contact sensor (microswitch) that kills the thrust and drops the battery to the bottom of the tube simultaneously upon first contact with the ground. Another thing to help make it uniform and consistent would be to put a lightweight and very thin ring around the outside of your feet. With four legs you have a contact square, so you have a variable center of mass height dependent on how it's oriented. The variable could range from the case where two feet touch simultaneously to the other extreme when it is rotated 45 degrees around the central axis. With this ring you might be able to reduce the total mass by removing one of the legs from the design. Just thinking three legs plus a ring could be lighter, more consistent, and a larger effective target area. That last term is meant to describe the area directly above which your center of mass can be located at the time of touchdown and still have a successful landing. This target area is what will dictate your maximum wind conditions. So any wind makes it so that you have to touchdown in a non-vertical position in order not to be sliding. In a non-vertical position the center of mass won't be directly over the point in between the landing feet until it tips back into a vertical position, which the wind would actually assist in doing. Again, wonderful job on achieving the goal of hovering the 'rocket simulator' and making a very entertaining video. I'll be in contact about the weather station.

[@featherbrain7147]

To my simple mind, the way you made those servos do the vectoring and twisting looked ingenious.

[@davidgibbon8927]

Try, try, try again... OR if at first you don't succeed - sod it! Seriously, I'm impressed with your abilities and perseverance. Well done!

[@WesDoyle]

Well done! Nice commentary, too

[@johnlysic6727]

Success - thank you this was extremely interesting

[@snipeguy08]

This man deserves more subscribers

[@cottonperez339]

thanks for letting us see how hard is to be successful in any project

[@johannesrnnenordentoft5303]

You did explain some few parts of the physic, but the important thing to get Falcon 9 stable is closed loop control / feedback control. - for this project you should look up PID controllers.

[@saber1epee0]

Johannes Rønne Nordentoft I would totally love to see him give a tutorial on the basics of PID. It's hard for a lot of folks (myself sometimes!) to get comfortable with. But as for this project, he sort of did- he used existing controls programming from a drone, which no doubt rely heavily on PID tuning.

[@stratmoss]

Lets get Elon Musk to see this. Tweet him if you have twitter!

[@stratmoss]

Yea many could but not many have.

[@TomStantonEngineering]

Yeah I realise that the rocketry part is very difficult, but I was more interested in the control and stability methods used to make a rocket hover. The physics behind the control methods are very similar, just without the huge budget and years of rocketry experience!

[@osimmac]

Hmmm, maybe SpaceX could add a stage 0, a sort of cradle that holds a falcon 9, and launches it up 10 - 20 km high. They could use this on their very heavy flights, to give the rocket enough of a boost where it can still land, and it would also increase their fully expendable payloads. it would be very reusable because it would just be a huge drone

[@frankfacts6207]

David Westernall no one does space rocketry like space x because space x doesn't do space rocketry

[@sasquatchjunk]

+Tom Stanton Hey Tom I think this was a HUGE success!! I get a kick out of seeing the types of projects you create and how you problem solve. Despite what another poster said, most people in RC could NOT do this due in large part to the complexity of building the thrust vectoring piece. I really hate when someone has to minimize another persons accomplishment. It's bad form! I'm curious about the motor choice. Did you go with a standard prop to avoid the spool up lag of an EDF? It would be great to find an indoor spot for this experiment to avoid the weather. When flying our smaller helis we would put down a sheet of plywood to keep from getting hung up on the grass. Thanks for taking the time to create this video and concept. It's fun to watch the build and see the progression of the "tweaks". Thanks again!

[@Lemonzrool]

I feel like Destin from @SmarterEveryDay would like to see this? :D

[@prashishjha4982]

It was a success. Love to see your videos

[@davidhoward5586]

Still a success to build upon. Great video thank you for the upload and ideas. Keep at it you will get there. You do not strike me as the type to give up that easily on anything once you have put your mind to it. Looking forward to your finished build on this VTLR.

[@engineerahmed7248]

U simply got to solve the equation of inverted pendulum & program in controller. For proof of concept go as small as u can. U should try simple 10$ gearbest quad & use its motors.

[@akizeta]

It strikes me that your prop-fan arrangement lacks one more feature that a rocket has, that the weight (and centre of gravity) won't continually change as the reaction mass runs out. As this feature would make the whole thing hellishly more complicated, one more reason _not_ to use rockets for this project. ;)

[@garybullwinkle6784]

The only reason for using a rocket in the first place is the lack of an oxidizer in space! If the oxidizer is readily available, why carry it?

[@akizeta]

Well, not the _only_ reason; one could use a gasoline engine with its own oxygen supply, if you could figure out how to make it give useful thrust. I get the impression Tom would have used a rocket if it could have been installed as easily, cheaply and safely as a prop-fan.

[@vistaero]

Gary Bullwinkle What? the oxidizer is only needed when you want to use a chemical rocket, and a chemical rocket is just one of the multiple options to get thrust in space. There are nuclear engines, ion engines, plasma engines, and lot more of things that don't use oxidizer since they don't burn anything. A fan connected to a battery doesn't use oxidizer by the way, it just needs atmosphere.

[@SashaNaronin]

Changing CoM isn't that hard to manage. What is really a pain is propellant (fuel) sloshing inside tanks. :)

[@stan.rarick8556]

I had a generally good idea of the physics involved (following the rocket developments since the 50s) but realized something new today ... the gimble correction angle needs to change during ascent due to changing center-of-mass.

[@Piereder1]

Certainly a success! Quite some progress over a rather short period of time. Ready to add some GPS.

[@haroldwestrich3312]

Success! ! !! totally cool video and project. You made great progress and I think 10 years ago no one outside the world's top rocket labs could do what you just did. I think its AWESOME ! ! !

[@cam_DA_Hawkdriver]

The legs grabbing - dynamic rollover. Same concept in helicopters. Good job and very interesting video! If only jet engines were cheap :)

[@basher4475]

14:16 : Me at the movies

[@roidroid]

Need to figure out a way to get extra thrust eh? The easiest method may be to shape the top (the air inlet) like a duct, so it pulls in extra air. RCModelReviews has a video on duct theory that may help out kzbin.info/www/bejne/eZbaZn18bdZpm7sm17s (he talks about the shape of the duct after 11:17 )

[@walkabout16]

The easiest way to show them landing, is just to reverse the film of the two boosters taking off lol

[@keithv4452]

nope, the exhaust plume is all wrong doing that.

[@robintaylor3713]

I hope these people also don't believe the moon landing as that required vertically landing a lunar lander

[@alanmcrae8594]

I would call it a success. Your engineering sustained a hover very well given the limited budget & basic components you have to work with and the additional complications created by varying wind pressure. Very cool to see your creativity & ingenuity at work in your videos. Thanks for sharing your adventure with the rest of us...

[@shivaattaripour7485]

I think it's a SUCCESS! I have no idea how to build these awesome things and it just fascinates me seeing it fly and hover.

[@PaulPaulPaulson]

If your rocket falls over you will not go to space today 🎶

[@BairdBanko]

not a rocket

[@ZagrosŞêxbizin]

You just built an oddly shaped helicopter man:/ it was good untill you shifted the CoM above.

[@thesentientneuron6550]

Zagros Ozkan That's the first thing I thought lol

[@ZagrosŞêxbizin]

Surya misleading clickbait titles..

[@thesentientneuron6550]

Zagros Ozkan Sadly Yeah. My expectation was at least a jet engine in there but nope. I was like wtf are these toy motors and then he puts them in there. I thought the case was 3d printed but nope. Then he said he shifted the CoM up and left me crying right there. Not to mention the unnecessarily long explanation and then basically putting a drone in a tube(not even a solid tube). Rule no. 1 of rocketry - CoM should be as low as possible during takeoff.

[@gianpa]

Well, I was going to say but I didn't want to be a smartass but it's basically a miniquad running betaflight with a foam cilinder on top...

[@ZagrosŞêxbizin]

gianpa exactly.. i guess it was too challenging to make it propulsive or whatever is the right word ..

[@Zak-ob5ze]

Not a rocket

[@RCLoversan]

Zak R Please take a look at my Rocket Drone aka landing a rocket vertically, without being a billionaire.

[@Zak-ob5ze]

RC Lover san looks like a rocket

[@BairdBanko]

thank you

[@stan.rarick8556]

Simulated rocket. Happy now?

[@lissau3]

Super success! One thing I would suggest is to modify your throttle curve to get more throttle resolution on your sticks. Seems like you needed to be in the 70%-100% range of throttle almost all of the time, so adjusting your throttle curve would give you much more resolution and you wouldn't have those drops in altitude when you tried to do just a small adjustment. Love your videos!

[@OgdenThorntonFamily]

Dude, you are a beast! I admire your interest and tenacity. You're an inspiration.

[@zestydude87]

I admire you for putting so much time and effort into this project.

[@DebasishMandal]

Its definitely a success! You are a legend man !!!!

[@micharogalewicz6249]

It was definitely a success. I was greatly amazed with how little tech you made this rocket fly, stable and controllable. Well done!

[@johnmclane9872]

very impressive. I can tell you worked hard on this video and I appreciate your efforts. I'm happy to see people like you in the world. You have a bright future as an engineer.

[@alanmcrae8594]

Some very creative engineering in this build. Thanks for explaining both the physics and the engineering solutions to the problems of rocket hovering. I thoroughly enjoyed this video and really admire the skilled workmanship that went into the model build.

[@anthonyc4328]

Very smart...from concept to final flying project...impressive

[@MiataLover13]

Awesome work and video! I wish you could do more evolving and upgrading on the actual rocket in a future video. Enjoying these type of videos a lot, keep up the great content!

[@ciberbri59]

Yes. I agree! Keep at it Tom. You evolved so well from version 1 to 2 that one wonders what 3 would bring ... maybe a lucrative contract with an educational toy manufacturer. Its so great to see the spacex buzz spreading into the younger generation.

[@thatgeezeruk]

Wow what a build!!! I think hanging it with very light string would have been better because the rocket would have autonomy while it was hovering with the string slack. I loved the gyro idea that was pure genius!

[@footynutguy]

I have just discovered your channel and really enjoyed this video. I am disabled so there’s no way I could do this so I’m totally envious of your abilities. I look forward to discovering what other things you have done. If they’re anywhere near as mad as this then I’m going to be hooked. Good luck on your future projects.

[@joshuaf4867]

Nice job on the video! Thanks for putting this together. I vote that it was a success!

[@miodice3]

Really cool man. Total success