Simple Altimeter?

[DTH Rocket]

Hey everybody, I'm part of a group at Iowa State University planning to compete in NASA's University Student Launch Initiative, and our project requires outputting the altitude information to an MCU which will control the deployment of the parachute and transmit the altitude data to the user in real time. Is there a (relatively inexpensive) altimeter out there that has this feature? In fact, recording and outputting the barometric pressure is probably all we need, since we will be programming everything else, so perhaps there is just some simple chip we need?

Thanks for any feedback!

 

[brianc]

The PerfectFlite MAWD has this capability.

sylvie369 posted about using it in this sparcfun thread-
https://forum.sparkfun.com/viewtopic.php?f=17&t=22517

A PM here on TRF (he logged in today) might be in order.

 

[sylvie369]

I'm here. Here's a thread on this forum about the topic:

https://www.rocketryforum.com/showthread.php?t=11166&highlight=XBee

Altimeters in general use the barometric altitude to deploy a parachute - that's how dual deployment works. Sending the data by radio to the ground is a different matter, though. As far as I know, the only relatively inexpensive altimeters that have telemetry are the Perfectflite MAWD ($100) and the Featherweight Raven ($150). I've been sending the data down from MAWDs, and I'm consistently getting good data.

 

[troj]

HI'm part of a group at Iowa State University planning to compete in NASA's University Student Launch Initiative

Are you part of the group that was out there last year? If so, we've met -- I was helping run the range.

Anyway, I wanted to let you know that I'm in the Omaha area, and if you and your team have questions, want someone to take a look at something, need help with a test launch -- any support you need, don't hesitate to ask. We're not that far away, we've supported SLI teams in the past, and would be more than happy to do so in the future.

-Kevin