The Best Space Projects in the Hackster Community

Geeks love space like stars love hydrogen and so December is Space Month here at Hackster. To celebrate, we've gathered the best space-themed projects from our community in this convenient list for your enjoyment and inspiration.

rDUINOScope

Getting to space is hard, but looking at space is easy with the right tools (or good eyes). A $100 entry level telescope is enough to get a good view of the moon and even catch a glimpse of other planets. But you can get better views more easily with powerful computer-controlled telescopes.

rDUINOScope is a "GoTo" motorized telescope mount and control system. Based on an Arduino Due development board, it uses a real-time clock and GPS module to determine what notable celestial bodies are overheard and what direction to to aim to see them. Use the touchscreen LCD to select a body and the telescope will automatically point at it. This works with a wide range of "dumb" telescopes, so you can likely use it with whatever model you already own.

Tiny Radio Telescope

When most people here the word "telescope," they think about an optical telescope. But that is just one type of telescope and there is a lot more to see in the sky than what is in the visible light spectrum. Radio waves exist on the same electromagnetic spectrum as visible light waves, but we normally can't see them. This affordable and compact radio telescope provides an image of the radio waves in the sky.

The key components for this project include a Raspberry Pi single-board computer, a satellite finder, a small satellite dish, an Arduino Nano, and two stepper motors. Because the satellite dish is small, it can't pick up radio signals coming from deep space. But it can see the radio waves coming from orbiting satellites. By using the stepper motors to scan the sky, it can generate an image of those satellite radio signals.

Compass for Astronomers

If you're on a limited budget, you don't need a fancy motorized telescope mount. You can do things the old-fashioned way by aiming your telescope manually. But to do that, you'll need to know your position on Earth and set your telescope accordingly in order to follow astronomical charts. This electronic compass helps you achieve that and doesn't even require GPS.

This unit works using centuries-old principles that long predate the invention of GPS systems. It relies on an Arduino Nano and electronic compass module to find magnetic north and everything from there is just math — don't worry, the device guides you through the math and performs the actual calculations. It helps you setup your telescope so you can find the celestial bodies visible in your hemisphere at a particular time. The 3D-printed enclosure is durable and small enough to carry with you to your next star party.

FPGA-Based Astronomy

Many raw images captured by both optical and radio telescopes look like little more than a empty square. But sensors can pick up data that can turn those images into something amazing with the right processing. Almost every picture of deep space that you've seen required heavy post-capture processing to separate the important data from the noise. This project uses an FPGA pipeline to gather as much data as possible from a low-cost image sensor, so the data can be processed to see faraway celestial bodies.

Adam Taylor started this project specifically to try and capture NEOWISE, which is a comet that was visible to the naked eye around the time it passed perihelion in 2020. But this project is useful for many other astronomical observations. It uses an Avnet MicroZed FPGA development board and Embedded Vision Kit, with a custom configuration written by Taylor to pull data from an OnSemi 1300 image sensor. While Taylor wasn't able to capture NEOWISE due to poor visibility conditions in his area, his work should be useful to many amateur astronomers.

SpaceX-Inspired EDF Rocket

Some people want to do more than just look at space — they want to actually visit space. Unless you're a billionaire, that is probably out of reach. But you can at least replicate the work of SpaceX at a small scale by building this model rocket capable of VTOL (vertical takeoff and landing) thanks to thrust-vectoring just like the real deal.

This model rocket doesn't use combustion for propulsion, but rather an EDF (electric ducted fan) engine. Like a real SpaceX rocket engine, that provides thrust in only a single direction. Staying upright during takeoff and landing all comes down to very careful redirection of that thrust. This model uses a Pixhawk 4 flight controller to monitor orientation and a servo motors to actuate the blade for thrust vectoring. As a bonus, an Arduino Nano controls retractable landing gear.

As you can see in the video, it gets very close to successfully landing. In one attempt, it seems that it would have landed if the landing gear were wider. Even as it stands, this is a very cool project. And we're sure that others can refine this work to make it more reliable.

SMRT: Sensor-based Model Rocket Telemetry

If you don't care about trying to replicate SpaceX's VTOL capability, you can reach extreme heights with conventional model rockets. But how will you know, objectively, what altitude your rocket can attain? That's where SMRT can help.

SMRT is a telemetry-recording device for model rockets based on the Particle Electron development board and an Infineon Sensor Hub Nano. It primarily takes advantage of the latter's DPS310 digital barometric pressure sensor to determine altitude. The electron records the altitude readings and then displays them on a graph that is easy to access on a smartphone via Bluetooth. Simply launch your rocket, retrieve it, and then use your smartphone to look at the graph and see how high your rocket traveled!

Ground Station for LoRa Satellites

The projects we've covered so far haven't exactly had practical applications, but this one is different. It is a ground station that acts as a gateway for LoRa satellites, which expand LoRa networks into space at least on a limited level. It won't let you send LoRa data transmissions via satellite, but rather receive telemetry data.

This takes advantage of the TinyGS project's satellites and these devices can join their network of ground stations. The important component is a Heltec ESP32 LoRa development board. Other than that, it requires power and an enclosure that can hold up to the elements. An external antenna improves reception. If you want to help improve LoRa networks, this is a great project.

Iridium Satellite Communication with Arduino

If you actually want to send data via satellite, then this is what you've been looking for. It is perfect for sending sensor data from remote locations that don't have cellular coverage. It will require an expensive RockBLOCK 9602 satellite modem, a Rock Seven subscription, and paid data transmission, but sometimes there is no other option.

The rest of the hardware will depend on what you want to achieve. The demonstration uses an Adafruit Ultimate GPS Breakout, a SparkFun SAMD21 Mini Breakout development board, and a small OLED screen. Those provide a good base on which you can add sensors to collect whatever data you want to transmit. While this isn't cheap, it is awesome that hobbyists utilize satellites in space for their projects.

Receiving Earth Photos From Satellites with TV Tuner

If you're a more frugal type that still wants to play with real satellites, you can intercept the satellite signals already being beamed down to your locations. There are thousands of satellites in orbit right now and many of them transmit data accessible to anyone with the hardware to receive it. As this project illustrates, you can even receive live images of the Earth captured by satellites.

The best thing about this project is that it is very affordable, since almost everything is done in software. All you need is a SDR (software-defined radio) tuner and a length of wire to act as an antenna. Connect the tuner to your computer and install the required software to start receiving satellite signals. Many of those signals are, of course, encrypted. But plenty of them are open for your enjoyment.

A Simple Kerbal Space Program Arduino Leonardo Controller

Moving on to pure fun, we have this custom controller for Kerbal Space Program (KSP). While ostensibly a video game, critics and physicists praise KSP for its accurate orbital mechanics. It is probably the closest any of us can get to running our own space program and launching rockets into the void.

You can play KSP with a keyboard and mouse or conventional game pad, but this DIY controller will make the experience much more immersive. It relies on the Arduino Leonardo's ability to act as a USB HID (human interface device), so any computer you plug it into will think it is a USB keyboard. You can use the same button/switch layout shown here, or get creative and develop your own.

Toy Spaceship Dashboard

Most of us became interested in space when we were children and a great way to foster that interest in the newest generation is by building something like this. Andrew Gross and Jonathan Gross designed this spaceship dashboard for their four-year-old niece who was just starting to get into space stuff. The cool thing about this is that it integrates nicely into any cardboard box-based spacecraft that kids might build.

This device is all about play, which means it doesn't need to accomplish anything but stimulating the imagination. It has buttons, knobs, and switches to press, with corresponding effects. The killer feature is the ability to receive video messages, so the uncles can send "space missions" to their niece. That's possible because a Raspberry Pi SBC sits at the heart of the project.

We can't provide proof, but we're pretty sure that if our uncles had built us one of these when we were kids, then we'd be astronauts by now.