AMRAAM.jpgAMRAAM-2 Video Rocket

The AMRAAM video rocket is my first attempt at flying a rocket with a video camera. It consists of a AMRAAM-2 rocket kit from Public Missiles Limited and an onboard wireless X10 camera. The X10 camera, which can be purchased for under $70, comes with a built in transmitter and a seperate reciever which makes it quite a deal. To record the video, I used a laptop with video capture capabilites, but any camcorder would also work. To power the ground reciever, I used a 12V motorcycle battery, which also doubled as the power source to ignite the rocket engine. The onboard transmitter was powered by a 9V battery which at 150 mAh should give about 30 minutes of usuage.

construction.jpgConstruction Details

Building the rocket took about 40 hours, with the electronics and launch systems taking most of that time. The detailed PML instructions that came with the AMRAAM kit made building the rocket itself rather straight forward, but the electronics were another matter. Click below to see the construction details and an itemized equipment list

First Flight - 3/16/03

The first flight went well, although the camera wasn’t securely mounted, allowing it to come loose right before launch. This also resulted in the camera being dislodged when the parachute deployed.


Onboard video



Ground Video


Second Flight - 3/30/03

The mounting problems from the first flight were solved by a center board to which all of the electronics were attached (see the construction section for more details). This gave a better camera angle allowing for more of the ground to be seen. Unfortunately, the rocket flew out of range and the signal was lost at apogee.


Onboard video