Team America Rocket Challenge 2017

Team America Rocketry Challenge (TARC) is an aerospace design and engineering event for teams of US secondary school students (7th through 12th grades) run by the NAR and the Aerospace Industries Association (AIA). Teams can be sponsored by schools or by nonprofit youth organizations such as Scouts, 4-H, or Civil Air Patrol (but not the NAR or other rocketry organizations).

The goal of TARC is to motivate students to pursue aerospace as an exciting career field, and it is co-sponsored by the American Association of Physics Teachers, Estes Industries, the Department of Defense, and NASA.

2017 Team America Rocketry Challenge registration is now open at rocketcontest.org. Teams may register anytime between now and December 2, 2016.

The 2017 Challenge brings a new difficulty to the competition: teams must transition between two different body tube diameters. Rockets must carry one raw egg to 775 feet and back safely in 41-43 seconds, returning it in a separate section. Remember to leave some extra margin in your engine selection, as national finalist teams will be expected to fly their rocket to a second higher target. As with last year, we're not specifying your recovery mechanism, so get creative!

See the rocketcontest.org website for the contest rules.

LUNAR is honored to support the TARC qualification launches again this year. TARC teams are welcome to participate in the regularly scheduled club launches. The launch fees are waived for all TARC teams. As the deadline approaches in April, special TARC are scheduled at Nasa Ames:

David Raimondi, TARC Launch Coordinator
d.raimondi@sbcglobal.net, 408.997.2571 (h) or 408.742.5173 (w)

 

There will be some additional competitions this year

TARC Essay Contest:

After 15 years of rocket contests, we’re ready to celebrate! That’s why we’re kicking off TARC 2017 with a contest to showcase the talent and excitement in our program. Our essay contest will award one winner a cash prize of $500 and a TARC website feature story. Two runners up will also have their essays published. See full details here. Deadline is December 16, 2016.

Engineering Notebook Competition:

The Engineering Notebook Contest is back again this year. You can read the rules here and see the notebook from the Odle Middle School Space Potatoes that won the 2016 contest. Even if you don't submit your notebook for the contest, we encourage you to keep one. Building an engineering notebook will help you keep organized and analyze your data. It’s not a coincidence that the Space Potatoes went on to win TARC 2016 and the International Rocketry Challenge. Entries will be judged by engineers from TARC sponsor companies and the winning team will be awarded a cash prize.

Team Outreach Competition:

The TARC Outreach Competition will also continue this season. The competition provides an opportunity to show off your team’s work getting others involved with rocketry and STEM. The team with the best TARC Outreach Competition score that submitted a valid set of qualifying flights (sorry DQs do not count), but did not make the top 100 teams by flight score, will earn a spot to compete in the National Finals and will be eligible to compete for prize money just like all the other teams. We will also award a prize at the National Finals to the team with the best overall outreach program. Teams in the top 100 are eligible for this award too. You can read full details here.

Central California TARC Team Mentor Volunteers:

A complete list of mentors can be found at the NAR website.

Special TARC Launch Schedule

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