In the fall of my sophomore year at Tufts I was co-leading the rocketry team, spending most of my time on leadership and logistical work. Since I wanted to keep working on technical projects, I decided to challenge myself by building a high-powered rocket made out of Pringles cans with a friend on the rocketry team.
After recruiting some friends to eat 3 cans of Pringles, we removed the bottoms of the cans. I 3D modeled coupler rings, which we 3D printed and used to glue the cans together. We then designed a fin assembly similar to the one I had designed for the team experimental rocket, which we lasercut and assembled. I designed a nosecone in SolidWorks, 3D printed it, and fit it into the body tube along with a parachute. This nosecone was a new design that made it easier and more secure to attach the parachute, and was later adopted in the team's rockets. Finally, I designed and 3D printed a motor retention system, which made sure the rocket motor wouldn't fall out of the rocket after it finished firing.
We launched and recovered the rocket successfully, although the fin assembly had broken when the parachute black powder charge fired. This failure resulted in a rethinking of the fin assembly design, and was ultimately what pushed me to redesign the assembly for our 2-stage rocket (discussed here). Additionally, one of the fins snapped upon contacting the ground, which taught us not to use acryllic in the future. Ultimately this project was successful, as we approached it with low stakes and we ended up learning a lot; this rocket informed the design of more important rocket designs later on.
Launch of the Pringles Rocket.