Awesome Rockets

The classic lava lamp finally gets the rocketship makeover it deserves. Created by lava lamp originators Mathmos, the Saturn Giant floor lamp measures 5 feet tall and stands on a trio of shiny aluminum legs. Each one is handmade in the UK and can be ordered in one of 10 lava color combinations.

Aerospace company SpinLaunch wants to launch rockets without rocket fuel. Their system uses an electric centrifuge to fling rockets up to 5000 mph. They plan to use the tech to put small satellites into low-earth orbit with less environmental impact and cost than current methods. On 10.22.21, they completed a suborbital test.

The S loves to build all kinds of things out of matchsticks, then light them on fire. In this clip, he built a cardboard model of a disc-shaped UFO, filled it up with 25,000 of the incendiary devices, then set them ablaze with awesome results. The spinning part of the lift-off was a nice touch.

Building full-size rockets typically requires the creation of costly custom tooling. But Relativity Space is taking a different approach to the problem, using a giant 3D printer and additive manufacturing to melt and form aluminum into the shape of a rocket. Veritasium takes us inside of their facility for a look at how it works.

We’ve seen some pretty rad computer cases over the years. Handy Geng might have just jumped to the top of the list with his retro rocket metal case. It looks amazing – especially the smoke machine and fire effect lighting that’s triggered with actual fire.

Blast off every time you sit down to doodle with this astronaut and rocket eraser set from Suck UK. The package includes a monochrome astronaut holding onto a silver pencil while on a spacewalk from their bright red rocketship — a great little gift for anyone into space exploration.

Artist Steve Gallagher makes this fun desk lamp that looks like a steampunk rocket ship. Each one is made from a cage light with a glass shade, various bits of pipe, and a wooden base. Four flicker bulb engines bring it to life. Available with clear, cobalt blue, or ruby red versions with an optional USB charging station.

(LOUD) Enjoy some rocketry goodness as Japan’s Interstellar Technologies, shows off a static test of one of their rockets. The ethanol/LOX-powered engine cranks out 12 Kilonewtons of thrust, which sounds like a lot until you realize the Space Shuttle’s solid rocket boosters produced more than 25,000 Kilonewtons of thrust.

Combining vinegar and baking soda inside a soda bottle creates an explosive amount of pressure – enough to launch the bottle sky high. Nick Uhas wanted to see not only how far he could make a soda bottle fly horizontally using this method, but also what would happen if he super-sized the experiment using a 5-gallon water jug.

SpaceX shared this sped-up footage of its Falcon 9 rocket as it took its SAOCOM 1B satellite payload into polar orbit, then returned its first stage safely to Earth. It’s worth watching if only for the rhythmic sounds that the thrusters make as they pulse on and off.

Warped Perception enjoys seeing how things look in slow-motion. He recently got the idea to launch a model rocket from inside of an aquarium, letting us see how it behaves both in and out of the water. We love the way its exhaust plume changes as it breaks the surface of the water.

Nominal is a unique pen with a design inspired by the retractable legs on the SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket. Each pen is made from 34 individual components, and is available in aluminum or stainless steel. A magnetic “crew cabin” slides off to reveal a black mother of pearl end cap, which can be monogrammed for a small fee.

Among its projects, SpaceX is working on Starship, a rocket which may someday help colonize Mars. In this test of Starship’s can-shaped SN5 test vehicle, the rocket launched from one pad, hovered at 500 feet, then landed on another, a process which could allow for quick exploration of distant sites across the red planet.

Launching rockets – even small ones – requires lots of precision math, engineering smarts, and attention to detail. So we appreciate this clip from BPS.space which shows off some of the many ways in which they screwed up, not the least of which being those first few launches in populous locations.

We used to play with those see-through water-powered rockets. Now, Haze Gray Art envisions what the Saturn V, Space Shuttle, Falcon Heavy, and the Space Launch System might look like if you could see inside of their fuel tanks during lift-off. The red is RP-1 kerosene, the orange is liquid hydrogen, and the blue is liquid oxygen.

Using an ultra high-speed camera and Schlieren imaging, scientists from RMIT University captured incredible footage of the jet bursting forth from a pressurized plastic soda bottle. The shapes that emerge are called “shock diamonds,” which occur due to pressure differences between exhaust and the surrounding air.

After wowing us with his Fallout-inspired Red Rocket, metal artist Engineer BrunS is back with an even more challenging build, a big bronze rocketship. Watching the precision-milled components fit together so perfectly is wonderfully satisfying. If you’ve got 1500 bucks to spare, you can even own this masterpiece

Learn a little bit about the chemistry and physics that go into the construction of a basic rocket in this clip from BBC Earth Lab’s Bang Goes the Theory. The demonstration with the oxy-acetylene soda bottle rockets is neat, but is way too dangerous to try at home.

After offering up a size shootout between Star Wars spacecraft, MetaBallStudios decided to do the same with some real world rockets and spaceships, from the diminutive 42 foot Black Arrow to the ginormous Saturn V, which was over 360 feet tall. They should have included some model rockets for comparison.

This cast aluminum wall clock is perfect for anyone who loves space, rockets, or classic sci-fi. The pointy metal rocketship looks like it’s straight out of an H.G. Wells story. It features an analog dial with brass details, and can be hung at any angle thanks to a rotating hanger on the back. It measures 17″ long from tip to tail.

While these wooden nightlights are designed for a space-themed kid’s room or nursery, we think they’d look great on any desk, dresser, or bedside table. Artist Sara Collet Watson sells these and many other cool nightlights in her Etsy shop. Sold with a curved outer skin, or with an open skeletal structure.

The Ohio State Marching Band sure knows how to put on a show. To celebrate 50 years since humans first landed on the Moon, they marched in formations inspired by the great space race of the 1950s and 1960s, and even recreated the Apollo 11 launch with help from a few fire extinguishers.

Don’t blink, or you might miss this insanely-fast sled as it zooms down the test rails at the U.S. Air Force’s Holloman Air Force Base. The rocket sled was clocked at a mindbending 6,599 mph as it almost instantly hit its peak speed. That’s roughly 8.6 times the speed of sound.

SpaceX continues to refine its reusable rocket, showing off a test where the Starhopper used its SN6 Raptor engine to launch nearly 500 feet into the air, then navigate over a landing pad, and touch down smoothly and in one piece. The company now hopes to apply the same tech to larger rockets.

To celebrate the 50th Anniversary of the Apollo 11 launch, the talented visual artists of 59 Productions created an incredible projection mapping on the Washington Monument that replicated the launch of the Saturn V rocket and its mission to the moon. Drew Geraci of District 7 Media shared this pristine 4K footage of the event.

Filmmakers Ryan Chylinski and MaryLiz Bender used high-speed cameras to capture incredible imagery from the launches of various SpaceX rockets. The footage is part of a larger project called Guidance Internal: Lessons from Astronauts, which is currently raising production funds on Kickstarter.