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KSP Community CubeSat

K^2

By K^2
in Science & Spaceflight

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Ultimate Mission?  

104 members have voted

  1. 1. Ultimate Mission?

    • LEO Only - Keep it safe
      55
    • Sun-Earth L1
      5
    • Sun-Earth L2
      1
    • Venus Capture
      14
    • Mars Capture
      23
    • Phobos Mission
      99
    • Jupiter Moons Mission
      14
    • Saturn Moons Mission
      14
    • Interstellar Space
      53

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deljr15

deljr15

Posted
Posted
Regarding the cables wrapping around, sliding contacts seem a tad risky to me. More importantly, I do not think that the wire tangle will be too much of an issue if we program intelligently. It can just spin around one way once, and back again the next time. Provided there are no easy places to snag or get caught, all should be fine letting the wires drift around a bit.

This is true. However I was envisioning a ratcheting system with only 1 way rotation. This could be used to very simply control position repeatability.

What I wonder is can we gather that data thru some means that don't require a sensor in the capsule.

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henryrasia

henryrasia

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Posted

What I wonder is can we gather that data thru some means that don't require a sensor in the capsule.

Can't atmosphere composition be determined through spectrometers analysing the refraction of light by the gas? If this would be simpler than sticking multiple atmospheric probes in each individual capsules, than maybe we'd have one of these alongside our cameras (or maybe the cameras can double as spectrometers?) for analysis when each hourly* flash flashes (for the timelapse)

*early, groundless estimate. Do not consider final.

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Newt

Newt

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Henryrasia: I have worked with stellar spectroscopy before, but mostly in the visible wavelengths. I am pretty sure that this would fall out of that band, which would mean we would need a special camera that can take images at nonstandard wavelengths. It is possible to fairly easily construct a spectroscope (I have done it at my kitchen table), but not such a camera, alas.

We could do this basically by shining a light through the container, through the air we are investigating, and through a narrow slit, into a filter that would act as a prism (diffraction grating, pretty easily available), and then into the normal camera optics. This would essentially project a rainbow onto the CCD, and the absorption of the gas would be compared to the output of the lamp and the absorption of the plastic container. I note that in the arrangement I have used, in order for this to be done without too much noise, combination of many frames was required, although the files could be black and white. I would also be concerned about precision. While we could easily assert the presence of, say, nitrogen, in our samples, it would be a different matter entirely to confidently say how much nitrogen relative to CO2, to oxygen et cetera, and to differentiate between the different samples, as minor fluctuations will be fairly important. Not impossible, but difficult.

If you are talking about mass spectrometry, which you may be, I will caution you that it will take far more than a fancy camera and a lamp to make it work.

Deljr: Okay. That makes sense to use, as we need to make sure that we keep the torus aligned right for the other work. I am thinking though that we might could do that some other way, say a hook that punches into one of several funnel shapes on the moss torus, and slides the assembly to where we want it to be? Then again that would be possibly more complicated and difficult to set up, whereas a ratchet will work, we know. Hmm....

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NERVAfan

NERVAfan

Posted
Posted

Mr0nak: I would somewhat question the reliability of that company. They do not seem to really have done that much, and we would be flying on a rather unproven rocket. I suppose that is the price of cheapness? Worth looking into at least.

I am quite skeptical they will fly anything to orbit any time soon. IMO something like Nanoracks is probably a more workable option.

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MrOnak

MrOnak

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Posted

@NERVAFan: Well true there are delays in Interorbitals Schedules but they have gone suborbital already and some of their customers expressed careful optimism that the year 2015 might be realistic for orbital launches. Does the KSP CubeSat initiative have a milestone plan as of now? If what I believe is right and you don't, I really don't see why "not any time soon" would be an issue for this.

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MBobrik

MBobrik

Posted
Posted
@NERVAFan: Well true there are delays in Interorbitals Schedules but they have gone suborbital already and some of their customers expressed careful optimism that the year 2015 might be realistic for orbital launches. Does the KSP CubeSat initiative have a milestone plan as of now? If what I believe is right and you don't, I really don't see why "not any time soon" would be an issue for this.

I took a quick look at their cubesat kits and they are useless for us. Solar panels not included, too small space for the payload, not rad hardened CPU, and a 5kbps transceiver. We could still use them to launch though. I would say, if they manage first succesful launch before we finish the sat, we will consider them. Until that, we should not count on them.

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MrOnak

MrOnak

Posted
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*sigh*

From the IOS brochure:

Each CubeSat Kit includes the following basic hardware and software:

- Printed Circuit Board Gerber Files

- Transceiver (FCC or equivalent license required)

- A Battery Pack

- Solar Cells

- A Power Management Control System (PMCS)

- Microcomputer

- Software

- Antennas

- Power switch

- Complete Instructions

[...]

Dimensions:

CubeSat Shell:OD = 10.16 cm (4.0 in), ID= 9.65 cm (3.8 in), Length = 11.43 cm (4.5 in)

Deployment Cylinder: OD = 15.24 cm (6.00 in) ID = 14.99 cm (5.90 in)

Mass: 1.00 kg or 1.33 kg

Mass is equivalent to the CalPoly spec, outer dimensions are equivalent to the CalPoly spec - not sure what you're referring to when you say "too small space for the payload" considering that most of your subsystems are not even vaguely decided on.

Solar panels are included.

You won't need radiation hardened electronics, there are lots of CubeSats with non-hardened electronics in LEO roughly equivalent to what IOS provides without and they're working just fine.

However, what makes Interorbitals worth looking at is not whether they give you solar panels or radiation hardened equipment but that you get a launch included in the price which you won't get from many others.

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MBobrik

MBobrik

Posted
Posted
*sigh*

From the IOS brochure:

Oh sry, how could I overlook that ? Ok panels *ARE* included. Not sure whether foldable or fixed, though.

not sure what you're referring to when you say "too small space for the payload" considering that most of your subsystems are not even vaguely decided on.

Take a look at the kit pictures, and then at our 3D scratchings of the sample holding container, then consider that there will be servos, cameras, IR sources and sensors added to it, and ask yourself, where that all would fit into the kit pictured.

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MBobrik

MBobrik

Posted
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Well the IOS cube isn't smaller than the 1U cubesat from CalPoly that you seem to want to use so I really don't see your argument.

Anyway, I'll let you all do your own research :)

I did not want to criticize or dismiss your ideas. If my last posts came across like that, I am sorry, that was not my intention.

I know, that the external dimmensions are practically identical.

What I wanted to say is, that, according to the photos of the assebled cubesat kits on their page, there seems to be too little space inside between the circuit boards of the kit to fit our payload in.

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Newt

Newt

Posted
Posted
So our discussions about our sat on the KSP forum board came to conclusion. But I think we should keep this thread alive for posting updates about our progress and for answering questions of KSP community members.

That makes sense. Is there some good way we could try to communicate that shift to the rest of the KSP forum, so interested people will know to look here for updates?

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