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Puff is a student-designed bi-propellant rocket engine that is designed to produce 2kN of thrust. It uses a mixture of N2O and isopropyl alcohol for its propellants.
Unlike most engines entered into Race2Space, Puff utilises an ablative-heatsink method to regulate its thermals. This method involves placing an ablative, phenolic insert within the combustion chamber, with an external steel sleeve encasing the engine. It is this casing that gives Puff its unique appearance.
The engine mainly uses machined parts apart from the injector (shown at the top of the image), which, due to complexity in the design, was 3D printed out of 316L Steel.
Race2Space
Race2Space
In the summer of 2024, SwanSEDS participated in its first Race2Space competition, where we successfully cold-flow tested our engine, enabling us to validate our engine characteristics.
We are now eagerly looking forward to hot-firing our engine in autumn 2025.
In November 2025, Puff was successfully hot-fired for the first time at Snowdonia Space Centre in Wales. It achieved a max thrust of 1.2kN and sustained a burn time of 5 seconds!
Although feed pressures limited the engine from reaching its 2kN design thrust, we are optimistic about the design and the progress we have made in less than a year!
We now look forward to designing a Thrust-Vector Controllable, Throttleable engine for 2025/26.
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