3/19/2026 4:08 PM - Finished research and started the project on this platform

Last week we completed research on various different things. We started by deciding over what gas we will be using, either Hydrogen or Helium. But after some deep considerations, we figured that using hydrogen gas would be harder and more dangerous to handle. Although we knew that Helium is more expensive than Hydrogen, we still decided on choosing helium because prioritising our safety is way more important than just achieving a higher altitude.

After doing this research, we moved on to finding proper products and equipments to our project. Since we wanted our Weather Balloon to reach the edge of the atmosphere, we had to minimize the number of items we will be sending with the balloon. So after doing some deep research, we decided on the products we will be using. That are: Barometric Pressure Sensor, Temperature Sensor, Ozone Sensor, Thermometer and GPS Sensor.

3/19/2026 4:32 PM - Started the Flight prediction, 3D Modeling and Coding

Today, we split into three sub-groups to accelerate our progress. The first group focused on flight path modeling using the SondeHub Predictor. Their simulations confirmed that our launch plan is highly feasible and gave us a better understanding of the projected landing zone.

Meanwhile, the second group began programming the ESP32, focusing on the core logic required to handle sensor data. The third group worked on the 3D design of our release mechanism, which is responsible for separating the weather balloon from the payload. Dividing the tasks this way has allowed us to tackle the hardware, software, and logistics all at once.

3/26/2026 - Extra Funding for the Project and Additional Project Work

Today, we looked for extra funding for the Weather Balloon project as we may need more money than what we could receive from the Hack club. Furthermore, we needed some extra money to start the project as soon as possible, so we can complete the project in our set timeline.

For the project itself, we worked on the github depository, developing it further and organising it for future use. Once again we split into three sub-groups. The first sub-group (technical) primarily focused on funding as a whole and focused on the technical aspect of the project. The second sub-group (administration), focused on this HackClub entry and Github depository, developing it further and organising it for future use. The third sub-group (research) contribute to the BOM and mainly researched gas prices, contacting gas companies to find the ideal gas company that we can buy gas from and seeing which prices are optimal for us.

One aspect that everyone focused on today was contacting and reaching out to multiple organisations like universities and other companies like science fair organisers asking them for support in our project through funding and other support in general. We also had a group discussion about fundraising for our project and talked about our potential partnership with another high school for this project.