This I can say, for a fact, is not true. PROFESSIONALS did the fueling and safing as was required by contractual arrangements ahead of time.
Eye witness testimony given to me says there was an argument about what to do about the RBF plug. Extenuating circumstances, a nearly perfect storm of them, including a "not really clear coloration" and several other factors caused the decision to be taken not to remove it.
But one thing is absolutely clear. AMSAT personal were NOT responsible for fueling and safing. One or more participated but in "red hand mode" as in, if you touch, your hand will be slapped until it is red.....
http://n4hy.smugmug.com/AMSAT/AO40-Phase-3D/010-Final-Assembly/2109994_HNF8H...
It was NOT as clear as you make it out as you can see and it was most decidedly not "firey red" and clear as to what to do.
Where things are clear, they were and are marked clearly:
http://ukamsat.files.wordpress.com/2013/02/ao-40.jpg
The deal is, AO-40 flew. It gave quite a long period of interesting operation. It did not attain all of its goals and was an unbelievable complex achievement from the birth of the concept:
http://n4hy.smugmug.com/AMSAT/AO40-Phase-3D/001-Marburg0590/2107966_HX26gC#!...
until its death, it was and remains AMSAT (all versions and hyphens) greatest achievement.
On Sat, Sep 21, 2013 at 10:19 PM, R Oler orbitjet@hotmail.com wrote:
The people installing them and safing them and all the other things were mostly not rocket scientist that is why somewhere on AO-40 there is a "remove before flight" what we call in the business "flag" flying RGO
Sent from my iPad
On Sep 22, 2013, at 1:55 AM, "Angus McLeod" amcleod@caribsurf.com
wrote:
As far as I know, the kick-motors used on the Phase-3 birds were NOT
cardboard tubes packed with homemade gunpowder. They were commercial grade motors obtained from the commercial aerospace industry. If I am wrong about this, and someone can jump in with facts, I'd be glad to hear.
On 09/21/2013 05:48 AM, Gordon JC Pearce wrote:
On Fri, Sep 20, 2013 at 11:23:29PM +0600, R Oler wrote: While anything is possible I will be very surprised (pleasntly) if
there is another amateur radio satellite with a liquid propulsion system that is managed by any amateur group that gets a ride into any sort of HEO transfer orbit.Ion engines might be different but after AO-40 and its propulsion issues the days of amateurs playing with rocket engines on commercial flights I suspect is over.
This is something I've often wondered about. "Oh hi, commercial rocket
company, can we stick our homebrewed rocket into your billion dollar vehicle?"
When people with more oil than weapons stuff some mix of chemicals into
a tube and crimp the end shut it's called an Improvised Explosive Device. We're supposed to somehow convince someone to let us tack our semitested bomb onto their flight? I doubt they're going to go for it...
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