The Indian Space Agency - A Multi-Mission Report

[tobykoby]

Part Zero: Mod List and Disclaimer

Disclaimer This is a simulated take on India's space programme using KSP. I am not in any way affiliated with the ISRO, and nothing posted in this thread by me should be taken as a statement relating to real-life India, its domestic or foreign policies, the real ISRO or any other space agency, any religious beliefs or anything else that migth spark a s**t storm. That taken care of, enjoy

Mod List as of 2015.08.27

KSP: 1.0.4 (Win32) - Unity: 4.6.4f1 - OS: Windows 8.1 (6.3.9600) 64bit

Filter Extensions - 2.4.1

Advanced Jet Engine - 2.3

B9 Aerospace Procedural Parts - 0.40

Community Resource Pack - 0.4.4

Connected Living Space - 1.1.3.1

Contract Configurator - 1.6.6

Contracts Window Plus - 1.0.5.3

CustomBarnKit - 1.1.1

Deadly Reentry - 7.2.2

DMagic Orbital Science - 1.0.8

Ferram Aerospace Research - 0.15.5

Firespitter - 7.1.4

Interstellar Fuel Switch - 1.15

RasterPropMonitor - 0.22.2

Kerbal Construction Time - 1.2.1

Kerbal Engineer Redux - 1.0.18

Kerbal Joint Reinforcement - 3.1.4

KSP-AVC Plugin - 1.1.5

ModularFlightIntegrator - 1.1.1

Procedural Wings - 0.10

Procedural Parts - 1.1.7

RealChute - 1.3.2.3

RealismOverhaul - 10.3

RealSolarSystem - 10.2

RemoteTech - 1.6.7

Saturatable RW - 1.10.1

SafeChute - 1.7.1

SCANsat - 1.1.4.1

SolverEngines - 1.9

StageRecovery - 1.5.7

TextureReplacer - 2.4.8

TAC Life Support - 0.11.1.20

Kerbal Alarm Clock - 3.4

TweakScale - 2.2.1

Universal Storage - 1.1.0.7

VenStockRevamp - 1.8

[x] Science! - 4.8

- - - Updated - - -

Part One: The Path to Space

The great firsts are either taken care of (1st artifical satellite, 1st human in space, 1st man on the moon) or a long way away (like the first human on Mars). Sure, there are great achivements like Curiosity, Dawn, or Cassini. And yet, India has decided to become a space-faring nation, not driven by a world-spanning ideological contest like the Cold War, but taking a rational, scientific path.

But the way up to Low Earth is long and hard, and needs to be taken one step at a time. So, the first thing to take off from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre (SDSC) was a little sounding rocket, only 1.25t, consisting of a a solid fuel booster taken from the Indian Navy, a probe body with 2 parachutes, an antenna and two science experiments: a thermometer and a barometer. Held aloft, by a single launch clamp, it rose to ~750m after ignition, where the parachutes deployed after measurements of temperature and air pressure were taken. The sounding rocket landed only a few feet away from the scorch marks it left on the Launch Pad. From there, it was recovered and studied intensly.

Picture: Sounding Rocket at SDSC before take-off

Picture: Sounding Rocket after landing

[Mister Dilsby]

Good start, and welcome to the forums! Not sure I've seen a lot of ISRO missions here before, should be very informative

[tobykoby]

Part One: The Path to Space (cont.)

Quickly after evaluating the sounding rocket data, the ISA officials decided that a liquid fuel engine was necessary for any bigger projects. And the first bigger project was announced quickly: The Satellite Launch Vehicle (SLV), the Indian government demanded, should be able to carry at least 1t of payload into a Low Earth Orbit. A prototype engine, burning ethanol and liquid oxygen, was developed and soon, the first development flight of the Satellite Launch Vehicle could take place.

The rocket was about 3m high, carried nearly a ton of fuel in pressurised tanks, and was equiped with a probe body with parachutes and some scientific experiments. After turning on the engine and releasing the clamp when full thrust had been achieved, the rocket sadly veered of course and crashed into a field not far from the Launch Pad. Later investigation by a special ISA panel revealed that the aerodynamic stability of the rocket and the influence of the engine gimbal had been over-estimated. Nevertheless, a few pieces of data could be sent before the rocket crashed, again increasing the knowledge ISA held with regard to flying rockets.

Picture: SLV 1 Dev Flight 1 just before takeoff

Picture: Since only a tiny fraction of the ethanol and oxygen had been burned, the explosion was quite spectacular

[tobykoby]

Part One: The Path to Space (cont.)

Having learned from the first development flight, ISA decided to up the ante. A ~10m rocket with 9 ethanol-oxygen engines and 4 winglets (we have learned from our recent failure) was built, and on top, the ISA installed a nose-cone-shaped probe body with a service bay full of sensors. With more than 15t of mass (~11t of which were fuel), the rocket gracefully lifted off in the early morning. The engines cut off after nearly 2 minutes at about 50km height. It zipped up to more 190km - passing the Karman line and becoming the first Indian vessel to reach space. After about 5 minutes, the vessel reached its apoapsis and started plummeting towards the Gulf of Bengal. It sent scientific data all the time, up until the point the parachutes were tested. There were four parachutes, one programmed to pre-deploy at 30000m, one at 20000m, one at 10000m and one at 5000m. When the first parachute deployed, contact with the probe was lost. A scout ship circling the Gulf east of the Satish Dhawan Space Centre reported debris falling down and hitting the ocean surface. Analyses of telemetry data revealed that the g-forces acting on the rocket after parachute pre-deployment were strong enough to tear the rocket apart. This, amongst the other data received, gave valuable insights into material behaviour and recovery techniques.

Both pictures show the SLV 1 Dev 2 Flight just after lift-off

[tobykoby]

Part One: The Path to Space (cont.)

The day had come. After countless committee meetings, calculations, design proposals, and engineering man-hours, the prototype of the SLV 1 was ready. On its top, the Raman 1 probe (named after the famous Indian physicist and Nobel Prize laureate, Chandrasekhara Venkata Raman) shimmered in the hot sun. The probe was about 2.5m high, had a diameter of 1.1m, was equipped with many scientific sensors and instruments, solar panels, guidance thrusters and about 160kg of hypergolic RCS fuel. All in all, it weighed just short of 1t.

Picture: The Raman-1 sitting atop the SLV 1.

The third stage - the circularisation stage - was nearly 4m long and 2m in diameter, held 3.8t of a kerosene-oxygene mixture (RP-1), and sported an engine with 50kN of thrust and vacuum ISP of 316. The second stage - the ascent stage - was just short of 8m long, 1.9m in diameter, held 25t of RP-1, with a 350kN engine with a vacuum ISP of 309 and a sea-level ISP of 215. The first stage - the launch stage - was about 14.5m long, 3.2m in diameter, and was designed to burn nearly 120t of RP-1 in two identical engines with a bit over 1mN thrust each, a sea-level ISP of 265 and a vacuum ISP of 296. So, all in all, the SLV was about 30m high, weighed just under 154t (with payload), and had a very complicated launch sequence.

The two launch clamps released the rocket after the LSEs (Launch Stage Engines) were at full thrust. Shortly after passing 100m/s vertical speed, the rocket began gradually pitching over towards the east. While the LSEs were spewing out their last ounces of fuel, creating over 5g of thrust, the ASE (Ascent Stage Engine) would kick in, and at the moment it was at full throttle, the launch stage would be seperated, the LSEs now dead. Why this? The ASE needed its fuel pressed into the combustion chambers for the initial burst, but at the moment the LSEs stopped accelerating, the second stage fuel would float freely in the tank. While the LSEs still worked, there was pressure. When the ASE kicked in, there was pressure. But if acceleration stopped for only for a second, vapour would float into the combustion chamber of the ASE, rendering any ignition dangerous or impossible. The burnt-out stage fell into the Gulf of Bengal.

Picture: Just before the LSEs burn out, the ASE kicks in.

The ASE continued burning, pushing the craft up to about an 380km apoapsis and 6.5 km/s speed. After it spent all its fuel, the stages seperated, the ascent stage fallling to a fiery death-by-burn-up above the Phillipines. The CSE (circularisation stage engine) needed another delicate manouver. It would be electronically activated in the range of the Kwajalein Atll in the Pacific (courtesy of NASA, with which ISA could cooperate), then the RCS thrusters would push the craft forward and thus push the RP-1 into the CSE. The eninge would then spool up, and raise the periapsis of the orbit to 120km. Then the circularisation stage would detach, ensuring it would eventually experience enough drag to lower its orbit and burn up in the atmosphere.

Picture: Just after the second stage sepration.

The RCS thrusters of the satellite would fire again and again until the Raman-1 would settle into a 400x400.9 km orbit with a 13.8° inclination.

Picture: Raman-1 above the Indian Ocean southwest of India.

[tobykoby]

Part One: The Path to Space (cont.)

The second satellite launchend by the ISA was Raman-2, which was modelled after Raman-1. This satellite, however, was designed to go into a polar orbit around Earth.

Picture: Raman-2 sitting atop the SLV 1 on the Launch Pad.

The problem was that the rocket could not straigth turn south after launch, or the discarded launch stage would have likely hit the South of India or even Sri Lanka - so either domestic turmoil or the contempt of the international community would have ensued. Therefore, the SLV 1 at first took a trajectory to the south-east. After launch stage seperation and ascent stage ignition, the rocket could turn to a southward trajectory, shifting the inclination while the first stage fell towards the Gulf of Bengal, far away from any population centre.

Picture: View from within the Mission Control Centre, showing the difference between the launch and ascent stage trajectories.

Raman-2 arrived in a 815km by 1875km orbit with a 83.6° inclination, enabling the ISA to collect additonal data about the behaviour of vessels in Low Earth Orbit.

Raman-2, raising its periapsis while measuring the magnetic field of Earth.

[Mister Dilsby]

The problem was that the rocket could not straigth turn south after launch, or the discarded launch stage would have likely hit the South of India or even Sri Lanka - so either domestic turmoil or the contempt of the international community would have ensued. Therefore, the SLV 1 at first took a trajectory to the south-east. After launch stage seperation and ascent stage ignition, the rocket could turn to a southward trajectory, shifting the inclination while the first stage fell towards the Gulf of Bengal, far away from any population centre.

I think I remember this one from real life--always more challenging to launch in our world, where city lights are stock and there are actually cities under them