KSP Community CubeSat

[Rakaydos]

if you want to talk about impossile missions, I've asked a question in the Phobos Cubesat thread, whether I've missed any requirements needed for the mission.

Then I welcome people ripping into why those requirements are impossible.

[cpast]

So, a chiller should also be cheap, because it's going to be in the pressurized area.

Chill it *how*?

[PakledHostage]

The things you'll hear on this thread...

The trouble with this forum is the funny mix of people who participate: everyone between average kids through adults with PhDs in physics and engineering. I can forgive the kids for making foolish suggestions, but this idea isn't going anywhere. Trying to get the community to consolidate on an achievable and realistic goal is like herding cats.

[notfruit]

We'll I'm leaving then.

[N_las]

Chill it *how*?

We just put one of these around the cubsat:

http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_ss_i_0_6?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=mini%20fridge&sprefix=mini+f%2Caps%2C243&rh=i%3Aaps%2Ck%3Amini%20fridge

But we should propably search for an inflatable one. It should fit into a second cubsat.

EDIT:

Someone stole my idea!

http://goodidea.me/inflatable-mini-fridge/

[Aethon]

Hey this is just a brainstorm session. Personally I can't see this (living cargo) as a reality, but I'm not one to stifle creativity.

Here's one of my favorite astronauts ever- perfectly suited for this mission. Tardigrades.

http://www.planetary.org/explore/projects/life/images/tardigrade_2.html

Check out the failed Phobos Grunt mission, which I supported, and am still heartbroken over. We can learn a lot from these mission reports:

http://www.planetary.org/blogs/guest-blogs/lou-friedman/3361.html

http://www.planetary.org/explore/projects/life/

http://www.planetary.org/blogs/bruce-betts/3327.html

Edited July 16, 2014 by Aethon

[Drunken Hobo]

Before anyone tries to go further with this moss idea, there are some very important questions:

How do you keep the moss alive pre-launch & before the inflatable module inflates?

How do you keep the moss hydrated in zero gravity?

How do you plan to keep the moss at the right temperature?

How do you plan to study the moss?

What can you learn from the moss that you couldn't more easily learn on Earth?

What would be the practical benefit to this knowledge?

As for the inflatable module, that also raises its own questions. Very quickly a seemingly simple idea becomes mind-boggling complex & completely unworkable for a small project. There are good reasons nobody has done this before.

[frizzank]

No one will ever be allowed to do something like that. Do you seriously think NASA would allow fooling around with vehicles capable of delivering a warhead?

The things you'll hear on this thread...

I am not suggesting they give dangerous rocket parts to anyone. I am suggesting a volunteer program run by NASA scientist and engineers for the purposes of education and promoting the space program using surplus rocket parts that are available at their disposal.

The people on this thread do not use any common sense...

Edited July 16, 2014 by frizzank

[Rakaydos]

I think we should ask NASA if we can use their mothballed or scrap rocket parts (SRB's, fuel tanks, rocket engines) to cobble together a real life Kerbal rocket.

This would be a volunteer project using parts that they were going to scrap anyways. The project would have a low chance of success but it would be a great experiment in terms of cost savings using off the shelf, garbage parts and still may give some useful scientific data.

Also it's right in line with Kerbal rocket launch philosophy.

Not from the ground... but if you can retrieve old nasa space debris and assemble it into a spacecraft, all power to you.

[Aethon]

Unfortunately NASA retains ownership of all it's spacecraft.

http://www.space.com/20317-apollo-moon-rocket-engines-bezos.html

[K^2]

http://enu.kz/repository/2010/AIAA-2010-8844.pdf

How this paper shows, you can have 1600 meters of aluminum tether just using 0,58kg of mass.

Even 100m would be a stretch with what we can reasonably put up there. This is definitely for larger sats.

[Kerbal01]

i love this community, all the crazy armchair scientists/engineers. and on the old nasa launcher as a LV idea: there is a full Titan IV-C lying in a hanger near my house (future exhibit for the NMUSAF0

[AngelLestat]

Go to the cubesats section of that paper. Those measures are for a 3U cubesat. 1600mts 0,58kg in tether. Then all the hardware to charge the tether and storage energy. Which give you 1,1kg total located in (1U) then in the paper said that you have 2U free of space to wherever you want to do.

Of course a 3U sat is a lot. Maybe there is a way to reduce that for a light way 2U configuration.

Or maybe a 1U configuration with half of the tether.

--------------

No matter what approach we want to follow, once you had some good idea, I guess it would be advisable to find support from people with experience in these kind of projects/technologies to guide us.

Edited July 16, 2014 by AngelLestat

[BagelRabbit]

Okay, I'm sure no one will read this small diatribe, but:

KSP is absolutely a wonderful game. It depicts real-life spacecraft mechanics incredibly well, from specific impulse to orbital mechanics.

However.

Expecting to have the KSP team create and deploy a CubeSat is simply impossible.

I'm currently working on a project to independently fly a rocket to 160,000 feet with a safe recovery. This project is widely frowned upon by many as being nearly impossible, in spite of the extensive simulations. The build is currently in progress, though I likely won't attempt the launch until next year. I know what I'm talking about when I talk rockets, because I make them in real life. The excited participants in this thread have no idea what they're getting themselves into, and I'm pretty sure they will be disappointed.

One of the main goals in this thread is to get a CubeSat to Phobos. Mind you, the propulsion method that would most likely be used, tiny xenon thrusters, are still heavily under development and aren't planned to fly for years. It would be impossible to communicate with the probe during the trip or, perhaps, even after arriving at Mars; it would be very nearly impossible to carry any traditional science instruments on the CubeSat. A rocket would have to be launched in almost precisely the correct orbital inclination to make this plan feasible. No CubeSat has survived for long enough to get to Mars. The technological hurdles that would have to be overcome are enormous, and would likely require a research and development budget far, far higher than the satellite itself would cost. This would make a crowd-funding campaign likely to not succeed, and private backers almost certainly wouldn't be willing to fund the multimillion-dollar cost.

NASA would likely be lukewarm with its support at best. It mostly, perhaps unfortunately, supports semi-professional teams aiming to do limited science in low Earth orbit. All CubeSats launched have carried extremely limited payloads. Some carry enough fuel to deorbit, others carry no fuel at all. NASA would likely be unwilling to support any project as ambitious as this one, let alone a project (and don't get me wrong here) mainly controlled by people who are in their teens and not professional aerospace engineers. They would correctly suspect that the people would be incapable of getting a craft working.

Don't even get me started on constructing a launch vehicle. If you honestly think that you can ask NASA for parts, then assemble an orbit-capable rocket from them... I'm not going to finish this statement, as I want to state facts and not be too mean.

I really admire the creativity of the people on the KSP forums, I really do. I just don't see this project working, and I see a lot of disappointed people who had their hopes too high.

I know that this post will soon be buried in the crowds, so I'll stop talking now.

[Kevon87]

I really admire the creativity of the people on the KSP forums, I really do. I just don't see this project working, and I see a lot of disappointed people who had their hopes too high.

I have no doubt that even sending up a 1U cubesat into LEO with a radio and a camera would be exceedingly difficult, both technically and financially. But not impossible, given enough people donating (remember, most of JPL plays KSP). But what needs to happen first is people need to agree on a realistic mission goal (such as some permutation of the above example.)With a good pitch on kickstarter and an emotional hook, anything is possible.

I think we need to work on said pitch.

[lajoswinkler]

We'll I'm leaving then.

Oh god, this is from my national TV... She was pregnant back then. Ironically, she was talking about oxygen and how we need it to live.

The trouble with this forum is the funny mix of people who participate: everyone between average kids through adults with PhDs in physics and engineering. I can forgive the kids for making foolish suggestions, but this idea isn't going anywhere. Trying to get the community to consolidate on an achievable and realistic goal is like herding cats.

I know, right? Herding cats. I think I'm going to start another mini-project.

[Mr Shifty]

As a first step toward a project like this, it might be a good idea to send a few KSP forum members to iCubeSat next May. Maybe we could even collaboratively prepare and present a paper. (Abstracts aren't due until April next year.) This would actually be pretty cool, and is a truly reasonable first step for this kind of project. Also allows networking, exposes us to ideas, etc.

[Rakaydos]

here's an idea... for a reentry test, having a U1 cubesat unfold from this:

Into something like this:

...using the hinges for flight control. The wings, of course, would have to be made of a sutibly heat tolerant material, but the idea is to gain flight control with a cubesat's launch characteristics, while protecting anything on the glider's backside.

[dharak1]

Or we could always just send back pictures from a 1 or 2U. It would be a great achievement still and we already have someone who has worked with sending images over radio. It's something to do and pictures of space never get old. We can even overlay borders of countries over the pictures to show people where they live.

[Aghanim]

Before anyone tries to go further with this moss idea, there are some very important questions:

How do you keep the moss alive pre-launch & before the inflatable module inflates?

How do you keep the moss hydrated in zero gravity?

How do you plan to keep the moss at the right temperature?

How do you plan to study the moss?

What can you learn from the moss that you couldn't more easily learn on Earth?

What would be the practical benefit to this knowledge?

As for the inflatable module, that also raises its own questions. Very quickly a seemingly simple idea becomes mind-boggling complex & completely unworkable for a small project. There are good reasons nobody has done this before.

1. As far as I know moss is resistant enough to survive prelaunch and predeployment

2. A cylinder full of wet wick, supplying water to the moss bed

3. We insulate the cubesat, and remove excess heat by Peltier cooler

4. I don't know yet

5. I don't know yet

6. I don't know yet

[AngelLestat]

here's an idea... for a reentry test, having a U1 cubesat unfold from this:

...using the hinges for flight control. The wings, of course, would have to be made of a sutibly heat tolerant material, but the idea is to gain flight control with a cubesat's launch characteristics, while protecting anything on the glider's backside.

The problem is that in KSP anything with wings fly.. It would be a headache try to design an aerodynamic shape (fit in the cubesat) to keep orientation and control over all the reentry without burn.

In that case I would go for a inflatable glider, this would reduce the reentry speed with bigger wing area, but the design would be a big mess too. Aerodynamics is not something easy.

Taking into account that we can not do tests over the reentry conditions.

Nice pictures and concept.. but I guess that is too hard even for NASA.

[Whirligig Girl]

As long as it uses Model Rocket Motors.

[dharak1]

I think the best mission objective we can achieve with the level of funding we will have is taking some pictures of Earth maybe even specific spots. We probably won't be able to bring a model rocket motor with us and the amount of information we can gain from it is limited. We won't get near enough money for an interplanetary mission or even a moon fly by one. Our best bet is to take what we can get and launch a cubesat for taking pictures and that's about it. We may not even get funding for that but it would be a waste not to try for one of the best things we can actually do.

[YourEverydayWaffle]

I say just focus on permanent LEO, with a camera and basic sensors.

That is ambitious enough, affordable with some crowdfunding, and should have a good chance of success.

I agree 100% with this. It's probably far harder than we think to get something somewhere besides LEO. We should, for all practical purposes, avoid aiming too high. Safer to do so than aim high for something higher than LEO. Anyways, even that would be a HUGE accomplishment. It's space (or really close to it, depending on the LEO height we're looking at). Just that opens up lots of possibilities for data collection (maybe instruments like spectrometers and other instruments that collect radiation and force data, and other instruments of such nature that one could use to find data correlations at certain times [i don't know, this all seems neat to me] and even though it might not be something very far beyond our atmosphere it would still be really awesome, man.

Edited July 17, 2014 by YourEverydayWaffle

[cpast]

I agree 100% with this. It's probably far harder than we think to get something somewhere besides LEO. We should, for all practical purposes, avoid aiming too high. Safer to do so than aim high for something higher than LEO. Anyways, even that would be a HUGE accomplishment. It's space (or really close to it, depending on the LEO height we're looking at). Just that opens up lots of possibilities for data collection and even though it might not be something very far beyond our atmosphere it would still be really awesome, man.

Anything not past the formal definition of space would literally not last a week in orbit - atmospheric drag means if you want to stay in orbit for a while, you need to be fairly high up.