At 03:00 AM 8/12/2008, G0MRF@aol.com wrote:
How about raising the perigee to give a long life and a slight increase in inclination to get us out of the GTO belt around from around 7 degrees to 15 degrees? I wonder what the saving is there, 400 Newton motor down to 50 Newton motor. Fuel from 60kg down to 15kg? Saving = 45 + 5kg = 1.5 million Euros? OK the figures are guesswork, but there must be savings.
Well, you're not going to get too many arguments from those of us south of the equator. :-) Inclination change is the most expensive manouvre, in terms of fuel consumption, so minimising this will dramatically reduce fuel consumption. Raising perigee, OTOH, is much less of a drain on fuel reserves.
5 turn helix on 2400. So, in the future, do we need 45 or 50 Watts of power in a 100kHz wide transponder? After all, if there are fewer amateurs, we can use less bandwidth saving power and mass in the process. 8 Watts and 50kHz? A consequence of such a design change would require a groundstation with more than a patch antenna to pick up the signal. But is that unreasonable, dishes are cheaper than launches.
There might be a fly in the ointment here. Many US hams are unable to erect any outside antennas. Down here, we're a bit more fortunate. It is true that dishes are cheaper than launches, but one has to find the "sweet spot". And maybe some of the money saved can go towards making it easier for newcomers to setup a suitable ground station.
excellent Delfi example, but instead look at the Intelsat spacecraft. Is it not the case that they have a 10 year lifespan which is limited by stationkeeping fuel? While they operate 24/7 the power comes from the solar cells. The batteries are used only in eclipse. With our P3 designs, as I understand them, the spacecraft can not function on solar cells alone. Unfortunately, the
Good idea. And that's where raising the satellite's perigee can have a big advantage. A higher perigee means fewer eclipses, which translates to less discharge cycles on the batteries, and longer periods of solar only operation possible.
If you look carefully, you'll see a series of compromises between cost, groundstation cost (has to be multiplied by the number of potential users) and groundstation practicality, coverage and the ability to run on solar power alone. Where is the sweet spot?
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