Design your parachute - A guide to landing your CanSat safely

This resource gives students a brief overview of the different options available when building a parachute for the CanSat Competition. Students will learn about the underlying physics of parachutes and their design and how to control the speed of their CanSat. 

Learning objectives:

• Understand...

Communicating with Radio - Ground control to major CanSat

To understand how everyday devices like mobile phones, routers and satellites work, we need to understand what radio waves are and how we can transmit information with them. Radio communication is one of the key elements in our CanSat. All the data needed for our scientific experiment will be sent from the CanSat...

Getting Started with CanSat - A Guide to the Primary Mission

This module outlines the main features of the Primary Mission for the CanSat Competition. In the Primary Mission, teams must measure the temperature and pressure and send the information to their ground station. Students will learn about the differences between the sensors they can use and about the challenges...

Meet Arduino! - Introduction to Arduino Computing using C++

This guide for students allows them to explore technology used in space through the Arduino tool. They can build circuits to blink an LED and to measure temperature, pressure and altitude. The basics of programming in C++ will be introduced using the Arduino IDE (Integrated Development Environment) software. This...

The Mathematics of Satellite Design - Origami

Origami with squares

Solar panels are an important part of satellite design. There are design constraints on the distance a panel can be from the core of the satellite. In order to increase the area of the panels, satellites of the future may well deploy panels other than rectangular ones....

The Mathematics of Satellite Design - Coolant tank, fuel tank and engine design

All the resources listed here are aimed at the age group 14 to 16, except for the "Space for Engine" resource. 

Coolant tank design

Making efficient use of physical space and of materials is a central theme of many engineering problems. In this challenge students...

The Mathematics of Satellite Design - Connecting Radiators

Connecting radiators

Radiators are used to keep the communications part of a satellite at an optimum temperature. This is necessary in order for the equipment to function correctly. Connecting the radiators together adds robustness to the system. In this challenge students investigate the...

The Mathematics of Satellite Design - Communications Frame

Being able to develop cost-effective solutions is an important aspect of engineering and one that students investigate in this challenge. This challenge looks at the maximum volume of a satellite communications frame made from a fixed length of tubing. There is some guidance given to students through a series of...

The Mathematics of Satellite Design - Packing Equipment

Satellites often carry communications equipment or experiments placed into modules. These are then placed in equipment cabinets. This challenge looks at the most efficient way of packing equipment modules into a cabinet. This is an open investigation that can be tackled in a variety of ways.

Mathematical...

The Mathematics of Satellite Design - Overview

These 17 resources use the context of satellite design to link in to areas of the mathematics curriculum.

The challenges enable students to take an active stance in the solving of mathematical problems. This is achieved through a variety of approaches; some of the challenges are very open, whilst for others...