Week 11: HABL Ballon Launch

Introduction:

This week in class we launched the HABL rig into the upper atmosphere. The rig contained a flipcam which would document the journey, hopefully to ‘space’, in video form. The balloon we used had the possibility of reaching altitudes of over 60,000 feet, which would technically be in the Stratosphere. Luckily we got a warm clear day for the launch, our class gathered and brought the balloon out to the center of campus and let it fly.

Methodology:

We had been working in preparation of launch for over a month. We began almost halfway through the semester with initial designs and research of what the balloon would need to survive a flight to the stratosphere. We had no goal for the official height the balloon reached; we just hoped to see the curvature of the earth and potentially the black of ‘space’. On launch day we brought the rig out and prepped it by placing the camera inside along with a GPS, saran wrap, hand warmers and insulation. The view hole was big enough for a clear view of video at all times. The balloon was filled to nearly a diameter of 8 feet and the rig was attached with about 4 feet of slack. We didn’t fill the balloon to capacity because it would increase in size as it rose. The helium molecules in the balloon increase size as the surrounding air pressure goes down; as a result the balloon volume goes up. With the camera rig hanging below the balloon we had hopes of the camera staying mostly at a downward angle through the upper air turbulence. Also the rig had an attached parachute to help protect it as it fell back to earth.

Discussion:

The balloon took off with high hopes, there wasn’t much wind, and there was a good amount of uplift from the balloon itself. There was a brief scare when it was leaving campus as it flew within about 20ft of a construction crane. However, after that close call it had a rather glorious flight up. After a few minutes we lost sight of the balloon and had to wait for the fateful return of the attached GPS to earth.

See this launch video taken by a camera on campus.

After about an hour we finally got a tracking signal from the GPS unit telling us that the rig had landed near Marshfield, WI. The balloon went up for over an hour and landed about an hour drive away from campus, that’s some good fuel efficiency! Unfortunately the camera only could hold one hour of footage so the video cut out shortly after the balloon popping. Luckily there are some fantastic images we were able to take from the video. Take a look at the images here.

Conclusion:

This was by far the most amazing thing we did in this class. How many people can say they launched a balloon into ‘outer space’? We did it as a class with a relatively small price tag, and a great experience working as a team. Though there were a few issues with the rig, for example the condensation on the video camera lens about a half hour into the video. However, these things can easily be adjusted for greater success for other runs or for the future generation.

This link is to the classes edited video of the balloon rig video.

Yeah we sent a balloon into space.