When Connor Kuhn ’26, Duelm, read his first book about the chemistry of fireworks, he knew he wanted to someday try to launch a rocket.
On a cold Saturday in November, Kuhn, along with fellow student Hannah Robertson and physics professor Sylke Boyd, joined teams from several other colleges, launching rockets as part of the High-Powered Rocket Challenge sponsored by the Minnesota Space Grant Consortium (MnSGC).
This was the first time in several years that UMN Morris has had a team participating in the challenge.
Before they could participate in the first round of this intercollegiate challenge, the students needed to build a rocket. Since there are no rocketry classes offered at Morris, they improvised, with help from MnSGC. Additionally, the project was mentored remotely by Augsburg physics professor Daniel Hickox-Young and Mubarak Abdi, one of his students. James Flaten, MnSGC associate director and former UMN Morris physics faculty, and Augsburg physics professor and UMN Morris alumnus Ben Stottrup also provided support for the Morris team.
“Through that, we were provided information and advice on how to build a rocket. We also were provided materials—wood for the rocket fins, the rocket body, and most of the electronics. More importantly, they were a helping hand, meeting frequently over Zoom and giving us advice while we were actually building the rocket.”
UMN Morris’s rocket team used a physics lab for a workspace and scavenged for tools and other materials. And eventually, they started building a rocket.
Kuhn had prior experience with construction growing up on a farm, so he handled most of the fabrication.
“I got interested in science by growing up on a farm. Science is integral for farming so its applications in technology are used daily. Similarly, rocket science also includes algebra, geometry, computing, chemistry, and physics.”
While Kuhn machined several of the parts and worked on the hardware aspects of the avionics bay, Robertson modeled all aspects of the rocket using a computer simulation and designed the fins. In particular, she designed the rocket’s distinctive loon features and named it Morris Maang, which is Anishinaabe for loon.
Using the OpenRocket software, Robertson calculated and measured the mass of every part of the rocket and followed a three-step verification process with UMN Twin Cities faculty to make sure the launch was safe mathematically and would be predictable. The verification process required the team to send the initial rocket without the motor to check stability, then verify again after the h195 motor was added. Finally, on the day of flight, all teams calculated the current wind speed at the precise location to ensure that the rocket would be stable enough to fly straight.
The rocket carried an H motor, an avionics bay with pressure sensor and firing controls, an altimeter, and two parachutes.
Kuhn and Robertson worked late many nights on the Morris Maang, pushing up against the deadline for the Nov. 22 launch.
That launch would be just the second rocket that Kuhn sent skyward.
“I launched one model rocket before we actually started building the high-powered rocket. A friend and I spent about six hours building two model rockets and then we launched on the same day.”
Kuhn learned a lot from that experience, including about motor power.
“My first rocket ever built went so high up in the sky, I lost it. So I learned that you need to have a parachute that is bright or just something that makes it contrast with the sky. Or, you need to have a tracker on your rocket, or a buzzer because I looked for that rocket for three hours and I could not find it.”
Kuhn took those lessons to heart and is proud of how well the Morris Maang did on the day of the launch.
“Out of the teams, all novices, our rocket was one of the best rockets. We had one of the best launches.”
Kuhn said the launch was a strange experience.
“You have this worry that something could go wrong, but then there's another half of you that is more rational, saying we prepared three months for this. We’ve double-checked everything. We've calculated the ejection charges. You know, we've done the mathematics. We've done all the work. This rocket ought to work. And thankfully, it did.”
After this taste of high-power rocketry, the UMN Morris team is hoping to participate in the Tripoli Minnesota High Power Rocketry Club’s Space Grant Midwest High-Power Rocketry Competition in the spring.
See photos from the launch and read more about the challenge.