USOFS

From CSTART Wiki

USOFS, or Uncontrolled SubOrbital Flight Simulator, is a program designed to simulate the flight of uncontrolled rockets on suborbital space flights, i.e. rockets which "go straight up and then go straight down", attaining a maximum altitude of at least 100 km. The USOFS software was originally developed to inform design decisions for the OHKLA project.

USOFS is part of the CSTART Software Library project.

[edit] Overview

USOFS simulates the trajectories of uncontrolled, vertically launched rockets by taking into account:

• Gravity
• Rocket engine thrust
• Aerodynamic drag

It is able to predict the values of the following quantities at all times during a flight:

• Altitude
• Velocity
• Acceleration
• Mach number
• Dynamic pressure

[edit] Code

The USOFS code is hosted at the CSTART Google Code project. You can browse the code through a web interface or checkout a copy of the Mercurial repository to your local disk.

[edit] TODO list

• Allow for different thrust profiles (other than constant thrust)
• Improve supersonic aerodynamics
• Account for effects of wind
• Account for effects of stabilising fins