Building Payloads for the Colorado Space Grant Consortium (CSGC) Demosat, High Altitude Student Platform (HASP), and a High-Powered Rocket.

Three payloads were designed, built, and flown on three different platforms. Each payload was mounted to a sled inside a cylindrical tube, allowing the payload to be removed, serviced, and replaced with minimal effort. Primary components included an experiment to measure sky polarization, a power monitoring system, a thermal control system, and a Mobius camera. The first platform was for the Colorado Space Grant Consortium (COSGC) DemoSat high-altitude balloon flight. This lightweight payload had a mass of 804 gm and rose to 32 km before the balloon burst. The second platform was a high-powered rocket powered by an Aerotech J401FJ-L solid propellant motor. It reached an altitude of 1.4 km and exceeded 10 Gs of acceleration. Redundant electronics to control drogue and main parachute deployment were included. The third platform was the High Altitude Student Platform (HASP), supported by the Louisiana Space Grant Consortium (LaSPACE), and launched from the Columbia Scientific Balloon Facility (CSBF) in New Mexico. This flight was at an altitude of 37 km for 9 hrs. This version of the payload used an external power source and included telemetry capability. Data from the Power, Thermal, Polarization, and Camera systems are presented and discussed.