How does it
work?

FOUNDATION

Cosmic Aerospace Tower (CAtower) was built in C# on the visual studio platform. Starting as a side project, the CAtower was a prototype idea to let rocketeers or people in the aerospace industry see visually and analytically the processed data from flight computers. Also inspired by futuristic films and dashboards, it gave rocketry a more surreal experience. After successfully building the first version in 7 days, it is finally ready to be released to the public.
Version 1.0 InDev of the CAtower will be released on June 7th, 2023.

HARDWARE COMUNICATION

Proper communication is crucial for live and responsive feedback from the instrumentation unit on your rocket.
First, we create a serial port functionality, then we initialize the component that is connected to the Serial Port. This gives us direct access to the various COM ports and Baud rates that are in use in order to properly connect the C#
program to the serial port of the flight computer to retrieve data.

Invoking functions in the various parts of the program allows for simultaneous changes in visuals and data.
The following function is a standard function that is directly linked to the serial port function mentioned before. This allows to read what is being printed into the monitor.

DATA PROCESSING

The data is printed out of the flight computer in something called "data packets". These strings contain the data that is needed to place them onto the UI. This is what the data packet should look like in the serial monitor:

@95.14x181.24y95.14z0.22X9.50Y-0.85Z22.19t146.13A1000.49P0c0C1S0T

The first character "@" tells the program that this is the first character of the new incoming data packet. Basically letting it know that the data is located after this character.

Then it is followed by values and the character "x". The "x" is the index character of Gyroscope X, telling the program that the following previously are the gyroscope values for the X axis. So in this case, 94.14 degrees on the X-axis. This same process is repeated for the rest of the data.

From this single line of data, we can retrieve the following:

Gyro X: 94.14 degrees
Gyro Y: 181.24 degrees
Gyro Z: 95.14 degrees

Acceleration on the X: 0.22 m/s^2
Acceleration on the Y: 9.50 m/s^2
Acceleration on the Z: -0.85 m/s^2

Temperature: 22.19 Celcius
Altitude: 146.13 m above sea level
Pressure: 1000.49 hPa

Continuity Terminal 1: FALSE *Not plugged into the battery
Continuity Terminal 2: FALSE *Not plugged into the battery

The current state of the rocket: State = 1
Time delay for pyro ejection: 0 seconds

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x
y
z

X
Y
Z

t
A
P

c
C

S
T

Gyroscope X
Gyroscope Y
Gyroscope Z

Accelerometer X
Accelerometer Y
Accelerometer Z

Temperature
Altitude
Pressure

Continuity on Terminal 1
Continuity on Terminal 2

State
Ejection delay after apogee

Variable

Use case

VARIABLES AVAILABLE AS OF v1.0 of CAtower

These are variables that the CAtower program can understand when outputted from the flight computer into the
serial monitor.