Just wondering is if you use a "array"of detectors, then
you can get a idea very quickly, and increase the field of view.
Why the "high" cost? Did you have to scrap everything,
or can you just treak it?

Also, might consider using a high-speed part if you have multiple
sensors, just image, even from the side you could determine the
direction of the target, so you could look left, look right, and then move
the "nosecone" to point towards the target. I would think you want at least
a 180 degree spread, and may be do-able, of course weight is
always the issue.

At 03:25 PM 9/13/2000, you wrote:
>Hello Sean,
>
>Like someone said..you learn from experience. And, judging by your mail, you
>learned alot either way.
>
>I'm curious about something, there has to be other ways to track a target
>instead of IR? IR seems too directional w/out a wide angle of "attack."
>
>I think an on-board camera for next time would be quite neat, maybe even
>implement on-board altimeters?
>
>All in all, I think your project was the awesome-est =) Just think, if you
>perfect it, install multi-stage engines (enough to make it to Mars), you
>could show NASA how it's REALLY done <g>.
>
>Best Regards,
>
>Tim Hamel
>
>In a message dated 9/13/00 12:02:16 AM Pacific Daylight Time,
>shb7@CORNELL.EDU writes:
>
>
><< Hi Tim,
>
>Yeah, when I saw  the video, I started laughing again because I thought it
>was a typical example of a couple of engineering nerds making fools out of
>themselves :-) (You can see my partner in crime, Anish, an EE student at
>Columbia Univ. in the left of the video frame. He actually hit the launch
>button) Of course, I do still consider it a worthwhile learning experience
>(it involved DSP, mechanical engineering, aerodynamics, flight simulation,
>control theory, etc.)
>
>If you take a look at http://www.people.cornell.edu/pages/shb7/btsam.html ,
>you can see more about it. Actually, the problem was that I forgot a major
>consideration during design: wind. The idea was for the rocket to seek the
>target suspended from the balloons you see in the background.
>
>What I forgot to take into account (until the day of the launch when it was
>too late) was that wind would cause the target to move around so much that
>it was impossible to point the rocket at it. By the time I had the rocket
>pointed and stepped back to launch, the balloons and target had moved out
>of the light sensor's field of view. SO, we decided to launch anyway(and
>see what the rocket might do!) because that was the last opportunity I
>would get before I had to go back up to school.
>
>I am attempting to analyze the video to get a rough idea of the rocket path
>and orientation. As you can see at the beginning of the video, the rocket
>fins are moving, so the search algo was running, and I want to see if the
>rocket path was at least consistent with what the PIC was supposed to be
>doing in the absence of a strong signal.
>
>I plan on trying again, but due to expense, it will probably be about a
>year before I do so.
>
>Sean
>
>  >>
>
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