Uploaded January 2021 | Updated September 2026, 1 hour ago

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This is a tutorial on how to perform a full flight simulation of a rocket taking off and landing. You will learn how a gravity turn works, the deorbit descent phase, boostback and entry burn, and controlling the pitch angle for a vertical touchdown.

It will be assumed that a single stage rocket takes off and lands i.e there is no stage seperation for this tutorial. You can then visualize it in FlightGear. If you do not have FlightGear, I also show you how to use MATLAB 3D Animation instead, which is just as good!

TIMESTAMPS:

00:31 - Intro and Theory
05:03 - Free Body Diagram of the Rocket
06:50 - Explaining the rocket flipping, re-entry, descent and touchdown
07:30 - Matlab Code Tutorial
08:30 - Simulink Model Tutorial
20:13 - Explaining simulation results
21:40 - Connecting the simulation to FlightGear
22:00 - Matlab 3D Animation (if you don't have FlightGear!)
22:51 - What the simulation looks like in FlightGear!
24:10 - Explaining the results / conclusion

Useful Links and Videos:

Falcon 1 (Merlin 1C Engine): http://www.georing.biz/usefull/Falcon1UsersGuide.pdf and here: b14643.de/Spacerockets_2/United_States_1/Falcon-9/Merlin/index.htm
Connecting MATLAB to FlightGear (Part 1): youtube.com/watch?v=jB-80cvV1Ao&
Guidance, Navigation and Control Design: youtube.com/watch?v=0AJ6E48Aj9U&

Thanks for watching!
~~My Udemy Courses on Motion Planning / Navigation / Trajectory Planning:
udemy.com/course/autonomous-robots-nonholonomic-motion-planning-algorithms
My Instagram: instagram.com/vinayak_desh
My Website: vinayakd.com