Jeffrey Buskirk

About

// suit check at the Space Analog for the Moon and Mars

I'm a rising junior in Aerospace Engineering at the University of Arizona's W.A. Franke Honors College with a 3.84 GPA and a focus in propulsion, CFD, and aerothermal analysis. I'm just as comfortable in a CAD model or CFD solver as I am at a mill, lathe, or test stand.

I've worked on compressor aerodynamics at Boom Supersonic and Honeywell, rocket motor hardware at R3 Aerospace, and spacecraft life-support systems through Paragon Space Development. Outside of industry, I'm the Chief Engineer of the University of Arizona's liquid rocket team, where I lead the design, construction, and testing of our rocket engines.

I like hard propulsion problems, hands-on engineering, and shipping real hardware.

CFD · Fluent · CFX · CFD++ · STAR-CCM+ Meshing · Pointwise · HELDEN FEA · Abaqus · ANSYS Thermal · NASA CEA CAD · NX · SolidWorks · Fusion 360 Code · Python · MATLAB · C++ Hardware · mill · lathe · additive

Jeffrey Buskirk in front of a Boom Supersonic aircraft in the hangar

// Boom Supersonic hangar

Jeffrey Buskirk in the cockpit of a Boom Supersonic test aircraft

// in the cockpit — Boom Supersonic engineering floor

Experience

Summer 2026

Engine Systems Engineering Intern

Boom Supersonic

Tiger-team member resolving a mission-critical low-pressure-compressor stall-margin issue — root-caused high Rotor 1 incidence and ran a DOE across IGV and rotor angles (60–100% corrected speed) to recover positive stall margin. Built an AI-integrated DOE dashboard and an unsteady-CFD pipeline, and redesigned the aft-turbine outlet diffuser to hit a <1.77% pressure-loss target while cutting cost ~50% (sheet metal vs. spin casting).

View my final presentation ↗

Winter 2026 – Present

Aerospace Engineering Intern

R3 Aerospace

Designed and validated solid-rocket-motor bulkheads for high-pressure operation, using ANSYS FEA to ensure structural integrity through hydro-proof and static-fire conditions; bridged design and manufacturing to resolve fabrication and tolerance challenges.

Fall 2026 – Present

Chief Engineer

Wildcat Rocket Engineering

Leading the design of Jeb Lite — a smaller but far more technically ambitious rocket than what I worked on as Propulsion Manager. Full story in the Rocketry section below.

Fall 2025 – Summer 2026

Propulsion Manager

Wildcat Rocket Engineering

Contributed to Sonoran Wildcat and Jeb — full story in the Rocketry section below.

Summer 2025

Compressor Aerodynamic Design & Analysis Intern

Honeywell Aerospace — Fans & Compressors

Analyzed HTF NG compressor performance maps in ANSYS CFX (~0.5% adiabatic-efficiency gain), built a FAST 1D-to-CFX benchmarking capability new to the team (~1% gain toward the 10,000 lbf thrust target), and ran large-scale CFD on Linux HPC with MATLAB tooling that cut post-processing runtime 20%.

Fall 2025 – Summer 2026

Engineering Research Associate

Space Analog for the Moon and Mars (SAM)

Led a 3-person team delivering a CO₂-removal test campaign for Paragon Space Development and ICES; designed and built the AC electrical control system for adsorption/desorption cycling. Co-authored a peer-reviewed ICES 2026 conference paper (see below).

Summer 2024

Test Engineering Intern

Honeywell Aerospace

Designed test articles for the updated RS-25 fuel/oxidizer valves (NASA Artemis SLS) in NX with cryogenic protocols; ran actuator testing for NASA Gateway docking hardware in cleanroom thermal-cycle environments; built a C++ controller for EVTOL actuation rigs (adopted by the customer); supported TVC actuator testing under a DoD contract.

Spring 2025

Risk Management Engineering Intern

U-Haul

Designed trailer-mover hardware in SolidWorks and validated a 200-component assembly in ANSYS Static Structural to mitigate ergonomic injury risk; presented to management (patent pending).

Rocketry

Project 01 · Wildcat Rocket Engineering

Sonoran Wildcat — the team's N₂O development engine

As Propulsion Manager, I contributed extensive fiberglass design and process testing/evaluation, and built the full propellant feed system. Sonoran Wildcat runs nitrous oxide and has been flown on IPA, E98, and even WD-40 — it's the team's development engine for characterizing injector and combustion performance across fuels.

// Sonoran Wildcat — launch operations, Wildcat Rocket Engineering

1st

FAR-OUT, Cat. A

2×

launched, one competition

N₂O

oxidizer, multi-fuel

A. Feed system

Designed and built the full propellant feed system — plumbing, valves, and pressurization for the N₂O oxidizer.

B. Fiberglass design & process

Led fiberglass design and process testing/evaluation, refining layup, cure, and qualification procedures for the composite structure.

C. Multi-fuel development engine

Flown on IPA, E98, and WD-40 across test campaigns — the team's testbed for characterizing injector and combustion performance across fuels.

D. FAR-OUT, Category A

First place; first team ever to launch a liquid rocket twice in one competition.

Project 02 · Wildcat Rocket Engineering

Jeb — a 1,400 lbf liquid engine

As Propulsion Manager, I owned end-to-end development of a 1,400 lbf nitrous–ethanol liquid engine (named Jeb, an homage to Kerbal Space Program) — design, manufacturing, a custom test stand, and cold-flow / static-fire campaigns.

1,400 lbf

thrust

1500 psi

hydro-proof

A. Hard-start investigation

When a hard start failed the engine's first hot-fire, I led the investigation — ran injector CFD in ANSYS to find the combustion-instability driver, then designed a new injector and refurbished the engine to resolve it.

B. Nozzle & thermal

Led CFD/FEA nozzle trade studies with NASA CEA and ANSYS Transient Thermal, quantifying wall heat flux to size wall thickness and select a copper nozzle.

C. Qualification testing

Spearheaded qualification for competition eligibility — hydrostatic proofs to 1500 psi and cold-flow tests characterizing electronic-dump and injector behavior.

D. Team, sponsors & logistics

Trained the team in ANSYS, CAD, and machining; secured ANSYS, SendCutSend, and Boltline/Stoke sponsorships; ran logistics and BOM tracking in Boltline.

Jeb integrated on the launch rail in the desert

// integration & launch operations — Arizona desert test site

ANSYS Fluent velocity contour through the nozzle

// ANSYS Fluent — velocity contour: flow chokes at the throat and accelerates to ~2,415 m/s through the bell

Project 03 · fully student-designed

Jeb Lite — my new rocket

As Chief Engineer, I'm now leading a rocket that's smaller than Sonoran Wildcat and Jeb but far more technically ambitious: a ground-up, fully student-designed N₂O/E98 liquid rocket — regeneratively-cooled chamber, pintle injector, and a Rao bell nozzle, developed with my own analysis and CFD tooling. Currently in final design ahead of PDR, with test plans in work and machining starting soon.

// ANSYS Transient Thermal — simulated regen chamber wall-temperature over a burn

Jeb Lite full rocket CAD assembly — regeneratively-cooled configuration

// full-vehicle CAD — regen nozzle (ground-test config.)

Jeb Lite full rocket CAD assembly — heat-sink nozzle configuration

// full-vehicle CAD — heat-sink nozzle (competition-flight config.)

8:1

target thrust-to-weight

600 lbf

target max thrust

N₂O / E98

propellants

100%

student-designed

A. Pintle injector

Designed and CFD-modeled the pintle / impinging injector flow field to tune mixing and stability for the N₂O/E98 combination.

B. Rao bell nozzle

Parametric 80% Rao bell contour generated from my own Python + MATLAB tools, then meshed and run in Fluent via an automated pipeline.

C. Regenerative cooling

Sized cooling channels and quantified wall heat flux to keep the chamber within thermal margin under sustained fire. The nozzle is hot-swappable by design — the regen nozzle is a ground-test article for extended static fires, while a heat-sink nozzle swaps in for competition flights to maximize thrust-to-weight.

D. Poppet valve & feed

Designed a custom poppet valve and feed system, detailed and ready for the upcoming machining and hydro-test campaign.

Cross-section of the regeneratively-cooled chamber and nozzle — Regen: chamber & nozzle cross-section

Rao bell nozzle contour — 80% Rao bell — chamber, throat & bell

Wall heat-flux distribution — Regen: wall heat-flux distribution

Cooling channel geometry — Regen: cooling-channel sizing

Research & Code

Publication

Further Design and Initial AI&T of the Carbon Dioxide Removal System for SAM

G. Hentzen, K. Staats, A. Ackerman, J. Buskirk, B. Phoebe, J. C. Knox

55th International Conference on Environmental Systems · ICES-2026-524 · 2026

Read the paper ↗ Slides ↗

SAM 4-bed carbon dioxide removal assembly — SAM 4-bed CO₂ removal assembly — I designed & built the AC control system (right)

Talk

Compressor Aerodynamics — Boom Supersonic intern final presentation

Summary of my summer engine-systems work, presented to Boom engineering & management.

View presentation ↗

nozzle-cfd — parametric nozzle design & CFD automation

A Python package I wrote to design a Rao bell nozzle from throat/exit/chamber parameters, mesh it, drive a Fluent solve, and post-process — so the whole team can iterate geometry in minutes instead of hours. Powers the Jeb Lite nozzle above.

nozzlecfd/geometry.pyPython

# Parabolic-approximation Rao bell contour (chamber -> exit)
def _rao_contour(r):
    Rt = r["throat_dia"] / 2.0
    Re = r["exit_dia"] / 2.0
    th_n, th_e = radians(r["theta_n"]), radians(r["theta_e"])
    Rn = 0.382 * Rt              # throat downstream arc

    # inflection point + parabola coefficients
    x_Ni = Rn * sin(th_n)
    r_Ni = Rt + Rn * (1 - cos(th_n))
    m1, m2 = tan(th_n), tan(th_e)
    L_par = 2 * (Re - r_Ni) / (m1 + m2)
    a = (m2 - m1) / (2 * L_par)
    b = m1 - 2 * a * x_Ni
    c = r_Ni - a*x_Ni**2 - b*x_Ni
    return sample_sections(a, b, c, ...)

nozzle-cfd/

geometry → mesh → Fluent journal → post-processing pipeline for rocket nozzles.

PythonANSYS FluentNumPy

rao_nozzle.m · altitude_calculator.m

MATLAB method-of-characteristics nozzle design plus altitude & performance tools.

MATLAB

Jeb / Jeb Lite CAD

Full engine & rocket CAD, pintle injector, poppet valve, nozzle molds, structural FEA.

SolidWorksSTEPANSYS

Regen cooling analysis suite

Channel sizing, wall-material trade study (316 stainless / copper / Inconel), and structural checks, exporting CAD-ready wall & channel curves — powers the Jeb Lite regen chamber above.

ExcelCAD curve export

Motor & injector performance sims

Injector sizing and motor performance modeling for Jeb Lite, built on the open-source HalfCatSim framework.

ExcelHalfCatSim

Bolt & structural calculators

Bolt pull-out and pressure sizing for bulkhead bolt circles.

Excel

Costed BOM

Full costed bill of materials for Jeb Lite.