Braedin Butler

Mechanical/Aerospace Engineer

Engineering Portfolio

Paramotor Cutaway System

I designed, assembled, and tested a system to jettison the main paraglider to automatically extract a reserve parachute. The front-mount parachute container was completely scratch built and sewn by me. This is a much more reliable rescue system compared to traditional systems. This has saved my life already in a real emergency scenario, which makes this the project I am most proud of.

PPG Smoke LLC

February 2020 - February 2022

Project Leader, Computer Engineer, and Mechanical Engineer

Active Noise Cancelling Headset

I designed and built a working prototype of an active noise cancelling headset, both the circuit board and the injection molded housing. This headset allows for communication via bluetooth phone call and aviation radio during flight. The headset offers active and passive hearing protection, which is especially helpful while operating loud aircraft.

Paramotor Smoke System

This is an image of me test flying the smoke system prototype I designed and built. I designed a circuit board to control the speed of a DC motor which injects baby oil into the exhaust of a paramotor. After passing through the hot exhaust pipe, the baby oil exits as a thick cloud of white smoke. Smoke displays are perfect during acrobatic paramotor routines and air shows.

Autoliv

May 2019 - October 2019

Process Engineer Summer Intern

High precision tablet measuring device

This device automatically measures the thickness of explosive tablets used in airbag systems. Since the geometry of each tablet is critical for controling burn rate, tablets must be held to a tight tolerance. This device had issues of imprecise measurements due to play in the mechanical parts. I was hired as an intern to fix this issue. I designed new parts that had zero play and I implemented a way to easily adjust and calibrate the machine.

OpenPPG

December 2017 - Present

Hardware and Firmware Engineer

Paramotor Swing Arms

There are few people in the acrobatic paramotor community, so there are few options of swing arms that are strong enough to withstand the G-forces of acrobatic maneuvers. Certain maneuvers can deliver up to 8 G, which would be enough force to bring standard swing arms to failure. I helped design new swing arms and ran structural analysis to ensure the new swing arms were strong enough to resist fatigue.

Electric Paramotor Throttle Controller

Starting out as a volunteer for this open source project, I designed and assembled a circuit board that communicates with an electronic speed controller for an electric paramotor. The throttle has a screen that displays telemetry data collected from the paramotor such as battery level, RPM, electrical current, battery temperature, and altitude. I also wrote the firmware for the throttle controller, packed full of useful features like beginner and expert mode, cruise control, and vibration feedback for warning the pilot of low battery or a hot speed controller. My skills with electronics and PCB design are completely self taught.

Creator of v^Speed Vario

May 2017 - Present

Hardware and Firmware Engineer

Open Source Flight Instrument

During the summer of 2017, I caught the electronics bug. I found a passion for designing circuit boards and seeing them come to life after uploading code. I began learning everything I could about electronics and designing circuit boards, mostly from watching YouTube. I couldn’t believe how much I learned. Later that summer, I produced several prototypes of an open source variometer for paragliding. A variometer is a flight instrument that indicates whether the aircraft is gaining altitude or losing altitude, which is extremely helpful for sports like paragliding and hang gliding. The variometer I created is the most affordable bluetooth enabled variometer on the market.