Technical papers, books, and articles

Aspirespace has benefited greatly from knowledge and advice passed-on by fellow rocketeers, so it's only fair that we pass on some of our own findings.

The downloadable technical papers below are written in PDF format for which you may need acrobat reader

We hope that you find these useful and educational, though remember that we're an amateur society: there may well be errors or omissions. Please send constructive criticism to Rick Newlands, check out his books at the bottom of this page.

These papers get updated and added to regularly, so do browse again.

Technical papers:

• Early Scottish spaceplane research: new 19/5/2021
• Parachute recovery system design for large rocket vehicles: updated 25/7/2020
• Development and Preliminary Testing of Paraffin Hybrid Rocket Fuel Grains with Helical Port Structures
• The merit of sharp edges: sharp edges on rocket vehicles 1/7/2017
• The thrust optimised parabolic nozzle: how to plot a bell nozzle updated 18/4/2017
• Rocket airframe concepts:17/12/2016
• Rocketry aerodynamics: updated 26/6/2016
• Winged rockets and boost gliders: updated 26/6/2016
• Rocket vehicle loads and airframe design: updated and clarified 1/6/2016
• Introduction to hybrid design: updated 6/1/2016
• Manned suborbital spacecraft missions: (includes Suborbital re-entry and Launching spaceplanes from a winged carrier aircraft) 23/3/2015
• Hybrid safety: greatly updated (70 pages, now includes table of contents and Lox, nitrous, and peroxide) 6/1/2015
• Rockoon balloon calculation Excel spreadsheet: 23/7/2013
• Launching rockets from a high altitude balloon: updated 2/3/2012
• Modelling the nitrous run tank emptying: code updated 3/1/2012
• The physics of nitrous oxide: updated 8/7/2011
• A dynamic stability rocket vehicle simulator: updated 6/6/2011
• Mass properties of a hybrid's liquid propellant: 4/11/2010
• Hybrid effects on stability: ammended 4/11/2010 (error in formula ammended)
• Supersonics and Waveriding: updated 5/11/2007
• Area-ruling, lowering rocket drag: updated 10/5/2007

Simple explanations for the general reader:

• How a rocket works: 17/11/2016
• How a wing lifts: 1/7/2016

For High-school students:

• A rocket trajectory simulator using high school physics: 23/12/2015 a zip-file containing an advanced Excel spreadsheet sim plus documentation explaining how it was written.

For young children:

• Water rocket science for children: 29/9/2010 (play the slideshow in Powerpoint to see the animated Gifs in action)

Here's a link to Dave Cooper's recoding of the Propellant Evaluation and Performance program PROPEP3 which is much more user-friendly than the old PROPEP and will run on 64-bit machines. Here's a zip file explaining what the results file means, and includes an updated list of propellants:

• What the results file means zip file : updated 8/12/2015

Rick Newlands has written two new rocketry books:

'Rockets and Space for young Rocketeers' is a children’s science book: a guide to home-built rocketry and spaceflight for ages 12 and upwards. It includes a chapter on how to make your own flying model rocket vehicles.

‘The science and design of the hybrid rocket engine’ is a textbook on rocket science, including full instructions for designing, constructing, and safely testing, nitrous hybrid rocket engines, both hobbyist size and man-carrying size. It features content on how to program a trajectory simulator in Excel, and how to plot a bell nozzle.

You can buy these books either in printed or ebook formats direct from the publisher Lulu by searching in the 'buy' section of their website, or from major online book retailers. Search for 'Richard Newlands'