NI to Support Texas Rocket Engineering Laboratory (TREL) in their Development of a Space-Capable Rocket
March 03 2021 - 09:00AM
Business Wire
NI empowers students at the University of Texas
to Engineer Ambitiously™ through donated systems and hardware
NI (NASDAQ: NATI) today announced its support of the Texas
Rocket Engineering Lab (TREL) at the University of Texas at Austin.
TREL, an interdisciplinary research lab that prepares students for
a new era of human spaceflight through hands-on projects in
rocketry and aerospace, is on a mission to launch a 28-foot-liquid
bipropellant rocket into space by the end of 2021. Supported by
NI’s testing hardware, simulation systems and guidance rooted in
bold, ambitious engineering, TREL is preparing to launch the most
powerful collegiate rocket ever built.
Named Halcyon, TREL’s rocket has been entered into the Base11
Space Challenge — an international competition that tasks
student-led teams to design, build and launch a liquid-propelled,
single-stage rocket to an altitude of 100 kilometers, the official
boundary between Earth's atmosphere and outer space. A successful
mission would place Halcyon 30 times farther than the previous
collegiate altitude record for a liquid bipropellant rocket and win
the TREL team a $1 million grand prize.
As Halcyon’s launch date approaches, the TREL team is shifting
its focus from component design and manufacturing to system
integration and testing. To support TREL’s testing efforts, NI will
provide over $150,000 of modular data-acquisition equipment and
software to help the team collect comprehensive data about
Halcyon’s systems through a series of tests.
“We are incredibly proud to support TREL and their endeavors,”
noted Nick Butler, chief marketing lead for the Aerospace, Defense,
and Government Business Unit at NI. “These students and researchers
epitomize what it means to Engineer Ambitiously, and their
applications represent a great example of the ongoing convergence
of design, test and integration where digital technologies are used
to accelerate productivity, innovation and discovery.”
TREL’s upcoming hotfire test, the first in a series of tests
enabled by NI, is a full-scale burn of the TXE-1 engine that will
generate over 2,500 pounds of thrust. This test will collect
crucial rocket engine metrics like thrust, efficiency and
temperature that will be used to optimize the lighter TXE-2 “Havoc”
Engine, which will launch Halcyon into space later this year.
Another vital milestone for the lab is the hardware-in-the-loop
(HIL) test, a virtual re-creation and simulation of the entire
rocket in flight and a step towards the digital transformation of
design and test. NI has created a custom testing rack that will
create digital twins of each rocket component, which can be
integrated together to create a full-scale simulation of Halcyon in
flight.
With NI’s support, the TREL team will push the boundaries of
collegiate rocketry and accelerate their own personal
development.
“Working with NI to test Halcyon has been a privilege. The
experience is invaluable, as this level of dynamic testing is
generally outside the scope of university classwork but ubiquitous
in industry. With our new ability to test Halcyon in a wide range
of mission scenarios, come launch day, we’ll be prepared for
anything,” said Stefan deBruyn, senior avionics software engineer
for TREL.
NI’s work with TREL is representative of its passion to develop
the next wave of testing equipment and testing engineers. NI is
supporting innovation at education institutions across the country
through skills development training, makerspaces and engineering
projects.
About TREL The Texas Rocket Engineering Lab (TREL) is an
interdisciplinary research lab dedicated to fostering the next
generation of aerospace pioneers in preparation for a new era of
human space exploration. By providing hands on experience in rocket
engineering, project management and business operations, TREL is
training a new set of innovators to overcome the multifaceted
problems of the future.
About NI At NI, we bring together the people, ideas and
technology so forward thinkers and creative problem solvers can
take on humanity’s biggest challenges. From data and automation to
research and validation, we provide the tailored,
software-connected systems engineers and enterprises need to
Engineer Ambitiously™ every day.
National Instruments, NI, ni.com and Engineer Ambitiously are
trademarks of National Instruments Corporation. Other product and
company names listed are trademarks or trade names of their
respective companies.
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version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210303005347/en/
NI Corporate Media Relations Amy Grabein amy.grabein@ni.com
pr@ni.com
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