On the Acquisition and Ascertainment of Knowledge

Descartes establishes the ideas of intuition, deduction, and enumeration as a set of tools used to acquire knowledge with a significant degree of certainty.  However, the definitions of the three ideas are neither mutually exclusive nor exhaustive in their coverage of all knowledge acquisition tactics.  These ideas may build upon, overlap, or even oppose eachContinueContinue reading “On the Acquisition and Ascertainment of Knowledge”

SpaceX Internship

https://youtu.be/pbtSTXFuU7w Summer 2022 has been the most educational, exhilarating, and fulfilling 3-month span in my life.   Looking up to the stars is a primal instinct.  As toddlers, our gazes probably drifted upward towards the night sky before we even knew what to make of what we were seeing.  As we begin to comprehend moreContinueContinue reading “SpaceX Internship”

ME C180

Engineering Analysis Using the Finite-Element Method ME C180 was an introductory course to the finite element method taught by Professor Sanjay Govindjee, a Structures and Materials Professor in the civil engineering department.  The finite element method is a mathematical method designed to help engineers break down complex physical problems and model/simulate them in a virtualContinueContinue reading “ME C180”

Manufacturing and Assembly

For manufacturing, we used a combination of in-house methods, outsourced jobs, and off-the-shelf components. Managing the budget was the trickiest part. Protolabs: For high-precision and geometrically complex components such as the terrained end-plates, we outsourced our manufacturing jobs to Protolabs. Raw materials and shipping costs were all included in the order. This was by farContinueContinue reading “Manufacturing and Assembly”

Dealing with failure and the next steps

Dealing with Failure Unfortunately, during launch, Astra’s ELaNa 41 mission lost control after 2nd stage separation and only reached an apogee of around 400 km before releasing the cubesat payloads and dropping back to earth. Cubesats were deployed roughly 100 km short of target orbit and with nowhere near the orbital velocity necessary. Despite this,ContinueContinue reading “Dealing with failure and the next steps”