KRPL
ARES HIGH POWER ROCKETS
The Ares program is KRPL’s platform for transonic, high fidelity flight testing. Airframes combine professionally fabricated fiberglass structures with 3D printed components produced in house, then are integrated, finished, tested, and flight-prepared at KRPL. ORCA I has flown on Ares I. Subsequent missions used Jolly Logic systems on Ares III, and all upcoming Ares vehicles will standardize on ORCA custom PCB flight computers for logging, telemetry, and parachute deployment.
ARES I
ARES I was the first rocket in the Ares Program, developed for L1 certification. It had a diameter of 2.6 inches, a total mass of 1600 grams with motor, and flew with a stability margin of 2.0 calibers.
The rocket featured 3D-printed components including the fin can with 4 beefy trapezoidal fins, nose cone, payload bay, bulkheads, centering rings, and couplers, with phenolic tubing used for the main airframe.
ARES I flew on a Cesaroni H255, reached Mach 0.6 and an altitude of 900 meters, and marked the debut of the ORCA I flight computer. Recovery failed due to a screw eye that was not properly secured after removing components to reduce weight, leading to a structural failure at ejection.
ARES I provided key data and design lessons that shaped the rest of the Ares Program.
ARES II
ARES II is the second vehicle in the Ares program, a full redesign of Ares I with reliability, structural margin, and aerodynamic cleanliness as first principles.
The 2.1 inch airframe pairs phenolic tubing with KRPL-printed fin can, nose cone, payload bay, bulkheads, and centering rings. All load-bearing parts were proven to 150% of calculated loads, steel eye bolts replaced screw eyes, and an aluminum motor retainer improved rigidity and heat tolerance. The vehicle was built to handle every phase of flight using a simple motor ejection architecture, flown without an onboard flight computer to prioritize mass and simplicity.
At Launch Canada, ARES II flew twice: a Cesaroni H175 to 2,000 ft at Mach 0.4 and a Cesaroni I204 to 3,850 ft at Mach 0.8, respectively. Both missions tracked straight, separated cleanly, and demonstrated stable descent profiles. It is KRPL’s most robust rocket to date and the baseline standard for future Ares builds.
ARES III is KRPL’s tallest Ares vehicle at 1.6 m, a flagship full fiberglass build around a 2.6 inch airframe with a fiberglass von Kármán nose cone and metal tip, trapezoidal fins, and fiberglass centering rings, couplers, and bulkplates.
It was designed with dual deployment capability, though both missions flew single deploy using a Jolly Logic chute release set near 700 ft. With a 1.85 caliber stability margin and a 1.4 kg liftoff mass, ARES III flew twice at Launch Canada, an I170 to 2,500 ft and a J270 to 5,200 ft on the threshold of Mach 1, marking the first supersonic flight survived by an Ares rocket.
Clean lines, high speed poise, and rock solid integration make it the benchmark for future Ares airframes.
ARES III
