I don't think we'll ever be in a position to "buy" a launch the most we will ever be able to do is hope to piggy-back with a paying customer and possibly contribute to "expenses."
$8,000,000 is our expected contribution to the "expenses". The actual launch cost is in the hundreds of millions.
Maybe having a payload "on the shelf ready" isn't such a bad plan ....
That's what Cubesats offer... ability to launch "off the shelf" satellites whenever an opportunity comes along, without having to do detailed integration with the launch vehicle. If only they were not so damn small...
there are possibilities however, SpaceX is going to do at least one full
and one
semi test flight on the heavy...the semi test flight is for the USAF and
they
are carrying ballast...and the final stage has to do a disposal burn.
Even the SpaceX test flights are booked with paying customers. There are no free rides anymore.
This is something I've often wondered about. "Oh hi, commercial rocket company, can we stick our homebrewed rocket into your billion dollar vehicle?"
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...
ESA and Ariane did accept that offer, three times no less with AO-10, AO-13 and AO-40. Miracles are sometimes possible but they are quite rare.
Could a 3U cubesat with deployable solar panels power a 1 watt, 100 kHz,
mode U/V transponder?
Yes, I believe that is possible, with deployable arrays we might even be able to do ten watts, but such a tiny satellite in such a high orbit will require big antennas on the ground just to hear it. I can already hear the cries on amsat-bb about the "elitists" who want to push the little guys out of the satellite game so they can keep the HEO satellite all to themselves.
Dan Schultz N8FGV
"The actual launch cost is in the hundreds of millions"
Not quite.
I work for a commercial launch provider, and the cost to put a large satellite (DirecTV or Intelsat) into GTO is $95~$110 million, inclusive.
You ship it to us, and we'll get it into space at the correct injection point.
Since we're always looking for new revenue streams, I specifically brought up the possibility of releasing cubesats or "other" secondary payloads before primary spacecraft separation, or after if better, as I know we have the capability to support it.
Top management replied (and knowing these guys personally I have no reason to doubt them) that they looked into it seriously, BUT.....
Since we don't build the "Payload Accommodation" (launch adapter, satellite support structure, fairing, avionics, ordinance, etc), we're at the mercy of the contractor who does build it to add in the capability of multiple satellite deployments, and the cost figure they came back with made it "economically infeasible to offer a secondary payload deployment service".
So while you may see launch providers that say they have the capability to drop off secondary payloads on their way to GTO, once you start talking "How much?", you'll find the game changes rapidly.
73, Jim KQ6EA
If I recall,the amateur satellite community were instrumental in pioneering the 'secondary payload' concept. Pity nobody thought to patent the idea!
On 09/22/2013 12:04 AM, Jim Jerzycke wrote:
"The actual launch cost is in the hundreds of millions"
Not quite.
I work for a commercial launch provider, and the cost to put a large satellite (DirecTV or Intelsat) into GTO is $95~$110 million, inclusive.
You ship it to us, and we'll get it into space at the correct injection point.
Since we're always looking for new revenue streams, I specifically brought up the possibility of releasing cubesats or "other" secondary payloads before primary spacecraft separation, or after if better, as I know we have the capability to support it.
Top management replied (and knowing these guys personally I have no reason to doubt them) that they looked into it seriously, BUT.....
Since we don't build the "Payload Accommodation" (launch adapter, satellite support structure, fairing, avionics, ordinance, etc), we're at the mercy of the contractor who does build it to add in the capability of multiple satellite deployments, and the cost figure they came back with made it "economically infeasible to offer a secondary payload deployment service".
So while you may see launch providers that say they have the capability to drop off secondary payloads on their way to GTO, once you start talking "How much?", you'll find the game changes rapidly.
73, Jim KQ6EA _______________________________________________ Sent via [email protected]. Opinions expressed are those of the author. Not an AMSAT-NA member? Join now to support the amateur satellite program! Subscription settings: http://amsat.org/mailman/listinfo/amsat-bb
On Sat, Sep 21, 2013 at 11:26:08PM -0400, Daniel Schultz wrote:
That's what Cubesats offer... ability to launch "off the shelf" satellites whenever an opportunity comes along, without having to do detailed integration with the launch vehicle. If only they were not so damn small...
They don't have to be big. Look at the sort of performance you can pack into a terrestrial radio these days!
I had a cheapy Chinese HT apart last week for repair (turns out it was extensively water-damaged, so it was a write-off) from one of the better cheapy Chinese manufacturers. The whole thing was on two thin boards, with the front panel board populated on both sides and the RF board mostly only populated on one side, and both boards fit side-by-side in the palm of my hand. The 1800mAh LiPoly battery was about the size of two Compactflash cards, and (when they haven't been drowned) run it for a full day of heavy use.
Now the cheapy Chinese radios are often criticised for poor spec, but these have a lovely clean output spectrum, solid 4W output and a 12dB SINAD down about -120dBm so you can't really fault them for that - tracking RF filters so the front end is good and tight too - so they must be doing something right.
The boards weigh about 50 grammes.
You could conceivably rip the RF board out of a UHF and VHF one and couple it with your own CPU and audio board, and have a ~150 gramme mode V/U transponder on a standard 10x10 cubesat board. You could use a 10m SDR and a wee DSP board like the ones that TI does for a few beer tokens and build Bob Bruniga's crossband PSK transponder. You could do all this for the price of the buffet for four and a couple of pints at my local Indian restaurant, and you could do it in a weekend.
You can cram a lot of radio into a tiny space these days, and with a cubesat you've got a bit of space about the size and weight of a bag of sugar. You could just about tape two big old Motorola GP340s together and fit them in a 2U launch. There's no excuse. Yes, the components are expensive (have you seen the price of a cubesat chassis?) but with enough people working on it we'll figure out a more affordable way to build a flight-rated cube.
First though, we need to stop bloody moaning about AO40.
-- Gordonjcp MM0YEQ
----- Original Message ----- From: "Daniel Schultz" [email protected] To: [email protected] Sent: Sunday, September 22, 2013 5:26 AM Subject: [amsat-bb] Re: Phase 3
Could a 3U cubesat with deployable solar panels power a 1 watt, 100 kHz, mode U/V transponder?
Yes, I believe that is possible, with deployable arrays we might even be able to do ten watts, but such a tiny satellite in such a high orbit will require big antennas on the ground just to hear it. I can already hear the cries on amsat-bb about the "elitists" who want to push the little guys out of the satellite game so they can keep the HEO satellite all to themselves.
Dan Schultz N8FGV
Hi Dan, N8FGV
You are correct because remember OSCAR-13 carried on a U/V transponder with 50 watt pep and a 2 meters RHCP antenna with 10 dBi gain.
Now if a 3U cubesat with deployable solar panels has a U/V transponder with 1 watt power the difference in EIRP between OSCAR-13 and the above 3U cubesat only considering power is: 10 log (50/1 ) = 17 dB 10 Now consider that the average of OSCAR-13 ground station were using 2 meters crossed dipole antennas with 13 dBi gain and you will see that to receive the downlink of the above 3U cubesat with the same S/N ratio of OSCAR-13 you must use a 2 meter crossed dipole antenna with 13+17 = 30 dBi gain i.e. an EME antenna.
Now consider that is possible, with deployable arrays we might even be able to get ten watt from the 3U cubesat than the difference in EIRP between OSCAR-13 and the above 3U cubesat only considering power is: 10 log (50/10 ) = 7 dB and you will see that to receive the downlink 10
of the above 3U cubesat with the same S/N ratio of OSCAR-13 you must use a 2 meter antenna with 13+7 = 20 dBi gain i.e. an array of four antennas with gain of 13 dBi each wich is convenient only for those amateurs working EME
I don't know what could be the 2 meters antenna gain on board of a 3U cubesat but I believe not more than the gain of a crossed dipole i.e. 2.14 dBi wich do not change significantly the above budged situation in order to reduce the gain of the 2 meters ground station antennas.
We will talk about on the phone as soon you will be in Naples in the next few days from 28 September to 1 October
73" de i8CVS Domenico
participants (5)
-
Angus McLeod -
Daniel Schultz -
Gordon JC Pearce -
i8cvs -
Jim Jerzycke