User documentation
No user's guide currently exists for OpenRocket. There is a page on the wiki for creating a User's guide.
If you would like to help, please extend it!
Technical documentation
OpenRocket was originally written as the Master's thesis of Sampo Niskanen at Helsinki University of Technology. The thesis currently functions as the technical documentation, and will be updated in the future to account for further enhancements. The thesis is licensed under a Creative Commons BY-NC-ND License.
Development of an Open Source model rocket simulation software (PDF, 1.3MB)
Table of contents:
- 1. Introduction
- 2. Basics of model rocket flight
- 3. Aerodynamic properties of model rockets
- 4. Flight simulation
- 5. The OpenRocket simulation software
- 6. Comparison with experimental data
- 7. Conclusion
- A. Nose cone and transition geometries
- B. Transonic wave drag of nose cones
- C. Streamer drag coefficient estimation
Resources
Below are resources that have been found useful in the analysis of model rockets. Many useful scientific aerodynamic articles and documents are available at the invaluable NASA Technical Resources Server (NTRS).
- The Theoretical Prediction of the Center of Pressure, James and Judith Barrowman, 1966.
- The original NARAM R&D report explaining how to calculate the CP position of a rocket.
- The Practical Calculation of the Aerodynamic Characteristics of Slender Finned Vehicles, James Barrowman, 1967.
- The more in-depth and technical thesis, where Barrowman presents methods for calculating the CP position of a rocket at both subsonic and supersonic velocities and its other aerodynamic properties. Available on NTRS.
- Wind instability—What Barrowman left out, Robert Galejs.
- An extension to the Barrowman method to account for body lift at large angles of attack.
- Topics in Advanced Model Rocketry, Mandell, Caporaso, Bengen, MIT Press, 1973.
- An excellent theoretical study on the flight of model rockets. Available as a reprint edition.
- Fluid-dynamic drag, Sighard Hoerner, published by the author, 1965.
- An excellent resource for all kinds of experimental data regarding drag. Available as a reprint edition.
- Tactical missile design, 2nd edition, Eugene L. Fleeman, AIAA, 2006.
- Useful approximation methods for estimating the aerodynamic properties of rockets.
- Applied Computational Aerodynamics, William Mason.
- An online textbook on computational aerodynamics.
- Design of aerodynamically stabilized free rockets, MIL-HDBK-762, US Army Missile Command, 1990.
- Military handbook on the design of rockets, a good resource for aerodynamic estimation methods.
- ThrustCurve.org, John Coker.
- An excellent resource for model rocket motor thrust curves.
- Static stability investigation of a single-stage sounding rocket at Mach numbers from 0.60 to 1.20, James Ferris, NASA-TN-D-4013, 1967.
- Static stability investigation of a sounding-rocket vehicle at Mach numbers from 1.50 to 4.63, Donald Babb and Dennis Fuller, NASA-TN-D-4014, 1967.
- Experimental data of a wind tunnel investigation of a sounding rocket at subsonic, transonic and supersonic velocities. Available on NTRS.
