Pocket SpaceCraft

[Ucender]

By random I mean that you have no purpose other than "sending it".

The purpose is not sending stuff in space, we cannot compete with space agencies for that. The purpose is to answer these questions :

- Can a group of citizens design and send their own ship in space with today's open technologies ?

- How far will they go ?

- How would they manage to do that ?

- What are the costs/benefits of such initiative for companies/agencies involved ?

- What skills were required ? What skills were acquired ?

All space agencies are much interested in the answers to these questions.

By the way, a few months ago, another question was : "Can a group of citizens take control of a 36-year old NASA probe ?". Guess what, the answer is yes : http://www.rockethub.com/projects/42228. ISEE-3 Reboot project leaders are absolutely not "random people", but KSP community is not random either. It is probably the biggest community of space fanatics

[R0cketC0der]

Hold your horses there. If you'd make it to the LEO - this would be a great achievement.

But let's start with some more realistic objectives: If you'd actually collect money for it - now that would be an achievement.

Yep. You still show your complete lack of knowledge if you think that the only cost involved is mounting cargo on a rocket and logistics associated, as you'd like to actually go somewhere with that thing.

Again: Real life is not KSP. Get used to that thought.

Even if you would have money for the satellite and managed to secure launch - there's still a very far way to go from sending a rock to space.

(And I laughed hard at Phobos cubesat mission made by random forum members)

You people should really read some literature and do a bit of maths before posting stuff like that Phobos mission, cause you look like a kids who think that adding jets to your back pack will make you a Boba Fett.

First of: yes, I don't know very much about how much these things would cost. And I would appreciate if you would tell me what exactly makes mounting a secondary payload so expensive and what your estimate cost for the launch would be.

However, I consider myself quite knowledgeable about most topics other than cost in rocketry. I certainly don't know anywhere near as much as anyone who actually works at NASA, but I know a lot more than your average KSP player.

[Aethon]

ESTES MOTORS. NO ONE HAS FIRED ONE IN SPACE.

Lol. Greg is definitely the Jeb (1, there'll be others) of our IRL Space program here.

With the money in my bank acct. ( Which isn't much!), and the planning we've done here, we already have a better space program than Namibia. No offense to Namibia. It's tough with the desert there and all.

[Aethon]

Or you could try exposing some extremophiles or algae to LEO conditions and see if they grow or make a long term materials study

Love it! But planetary protection protocols will probably keep us from soft landing anywhere. See Mars life search hindered by planetary protection concerns.

http://www.space.com/21745-mars-life-search-planetary-protection.html

Sky_walker, As the only real nay sayer here, you are a valuable part of this discussion. Hopefully a voice of reason and sanity. Let's be sure and keep this a friendly discussion. I welcome all who see problems with our plan to speak up, but let's not complain for the sake of complaining. If you think it's dumb, you don't have to participate.

[XIRA]

A Cubesat costs around $10000-20000 to construct. If Nasa or Esa doesn't want to give our Cubesat a free ride it will cost around $100000 to launch one, making the total costs a minimum of $110000. Raising such an amount of money is going to be incredibly hard. I guess the free launch by a large space agency is going to be essential

[R0cketC0der]

Love it! But planetary protection protocols will probably keep us from soft landing anywhere. See Mars life search hindered by planetary protection concerns.

http://www.space.com/21745-mars-life-search-planetary-protection.html

Wait... You aren't seriously thinking that a cubesat developed by a game community could land anywhere, do you? That would probably require multiple million dollars in funds.

[shynung]

Looking at some other numbers, with successful gravity assists, aerobraking on Mars, and another 600m/s of delta-V, it'd be possible to land on Phobos. That would be pushing 3U to the limit, but it's the most insane, most Kerbalest thing I can imagine doing with the cubesat. I think, that should be the ultimate goal, with Mars fly-by/orbiter being one tier down.

Let's just hope the CubeSat 3U has enough struts to do the job.

[Whirligig Girl]

Lol. Greg is definitely the Jeb (1, there'll be others) of our IRL Space program here.

With the money in my bank acct. ( Which isn't much!), and the planning we've done here, we already have a better space program than Namibia. No offense to Namibia. It's tough with the desert there and all.

Gregory "Jebediah" Bohannon. I like the sound of that.

[Aethon]

Wait... You aren't seriously thinking that a cubesat developed by a game community could land anywhere, do you? That would probably require multiple million dollars in funds.

I wasn't until K^2 said he was doing a feasibility study on it.

[RogueMason]

Interesting stuff. If things look suitably promising, you may well have my support. I think the Phobos mission would be cool, but obviously budget and operating constraints may put a shackle on that. Still, if it's manageable, then I say why not?

I'll be keeping my eye on this to see where it leads

[Nicholander]

A Cubesat costs around $10000-20000 to construct. If Nasa or Esa doesn't want to give our Cubesat a free ride it will cost around $100000 to launch one, making the total costs a minimum of $110000. Raising such an amount of money is going to be incredibly hard. I guess the free launch by a large space agency is going to be essential

100,000$ to get a LEO ride? judging from the original goal for SkyCube (one of the first KickStarter launched satellites), which was 82,500$, that does not seem to be the case. And some of that money would have to be used for other purposes, like testing, constructing and designing to actual Cubesat, advertising, etc. And CAT's original goal was 50,000$, And they were even developing a new propulsion system.

EDIT: Though, SkyCube was just a U1 and it was launched form the ISS from the "Cubesat Cannon" on the JEM, along with 7 other satellites.

Edited July 15, 2014 by Nicholander

[Rakaydos]

Also, I think peole may be missing the point of having a "Fire an Estes engine in LEO" level to this project.

Sure, we'll need a lot more money in order to do the fun stuff like shoot for the moon, but if we dont have enough for that, having a lesser project that we can do on a shoestring lets us go, "Alright, we did something in LEO! Now give us more money to try something harder!" for a second kickstarter.

[Nicholander]

I agree Rakaydos, but could for our first KickStarter, if the stretch goals are to go to other places (Moon, GTO,GEO, L1, L2, Interplanetary, etc.), should we change where our current CubeSat goes or should we launch another CubeSat that goes to where ever the stretch goal said if we reach a stretch goal?

Edited July 15, 2014 by Nicholander

[Rakaydos]

I feel that the kickstarter should be for "we launch something!" and stretch goals decide how far we try to go. However, if we get enough overfunding to pay for a second trip to orbit, by all means, let us send a second ship!

This applies equally to the second (and third) kickstarters, as well.

[Nicholander]

Hey everyone, this KSP community KickStarter has gone to this thread: http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/86010-KSP-Community-CubeSat, so you should probably move the discussion to that thread.