OHKLA Press Kit text
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[edit] What is OHKLA?
OHKLA is a volunteer project to openly and collaboratively design and build a hybrid rocket which is capable of flying past the Kármán line.
[edit] What is a hybrid rocket?
In order to understand what a hybrid rocket is, it is important to first know that the "fuel" that rocket engines burn actually has two parts to it; the fuel material and the oxidizer material. A fuel material is something which can burn, and an oxidizer material is something which can supply oxygen to the burning process because there is no oxygen in space (nor much at high altitudes). These two parts can be either liquid or solid, and it is this that helps us define a hybrid rocket in contrast to other rocket types.
A hybrid rocket engine (or just a hybrid rocket) is one in which one of these materials (usually the fuel material) is solid and the other is liquid. Two other types of rockets demonstrate other methods; solid rockets, in which fuel and oxidizer are combined in a single solid material, and liquid rockets, in which fuel and oxidizer are both liquids and are mixed together before burning.
Hybrid rockets are very popular with small, low-budget space projects because they are simple, safe, easy to control and cheap. The first non-government rocket to carry humans into space, SpaceShipOne, used a hybrid engine.
[edit] What is the Kármán line?
The Kármán line is an imaginary, invisible line around the Earth, drawn 100 km (62.1 miles) above sea level. It is an internationally agreed upon definition of the "boundary of space". Anything underneath the Kármán line, like birds, planes and helicopters, is not officially "in space". Anything above the Kármán line, like satellites, the Space Shuttle or the International Space Station, is officially "in space". By hoping to build the OHKLA rocket so that it can fly higher than the Kármán line, we are hoping to send it into space.
[edit] Who is organizing OHKLA?
[edit] How large will the rocket be and how much will it weigh?
The details of the rocket size and shape are changing as we do more work on our designs. Currently, we expect that the rocket will be about 6 m (20 feet) tall and somewhere between 20 and 30 cm (8 and 12 inches) in diameter. It will weigh around 60 kg when empty, and the fuel and oxidizer together will weigh around 110 kg.
[edit] How fast will the rocket go and how long will the flight last?
The maximum speed will be somewhere around 6125 km/h (3806 mi/h).
