KSP Community CubeSat

[Kryten]

NASA only provides free rides for American educational payloads.

[K^2]

NASA only provides free rides for American educational payloads.

We might be able to organize that. I have connections at several universities and High Schools with professors who do various educational programs.

I'd rather not, because we'd have more freedom. So if we can pull together enough money for a completely independent launch, that'd be much better. But if we can only raise the funds for the basic hardware, it'd be better than scrubbing the mission.

[Endersmens]

Hey all! So i started to read through the entire thread, and got to page 62 before I got sidetracked with .24 (finally got it a week ago) I planned on reading the entire thread so I didn't miss anything and didn't have to ask a bunch of questions, but i figured, screw it, I'll just jump in anyways. I think this idea is an amazing one. I'm not sure how much I can do to help with this mission, since i'm 16, but I would gladly do whatever I can. I could talk to my science and physics teachers at my school. Maybe The physics class at my school would be interested in participating. Just a random throw it out there idea. So I just have one question. Do you guys think I'm obsolete? or do you think I could help in some, however small, way?

[Nicholander]

Hmm? Obsolete? Never! Your age doesn't matter, we need all the help we can get! Also about the Indian/Chinese launchers, I really don't why I talked about it, but I still belive that we should get a NASA/ESA/JAXA ride.

[Nicholander]

Oh, and I found this kinda-CubeSat mod for KSP, here:http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/91616-0-24-2-BoxSat-vA-01-Released-08-23-14

[K^2]

Found the problem with my code. The β'₁ term is wrong. The ∂U/∂r portion of it is right, but ∂U/∂θ term is also non-zero. So I have to add that in.

The rest looks good, though. β₁ has the strongest impact on position of the satellite along the orbit, but not on the shape itself. So the trajectory matches. Which is good.

[LvL]

i'm 16. do you think I could help in some, however small, way?

I'm 12 and I'm helping

[LvL]

oh, and k^2? if we do get a free ride from NASA, are we gonna get the cubesat up to the ISS and deploy the cubesat there? if we will, how will we get it away from the station? should we change the size of our orbit? If we're just gonna detach it from the rocket, then how are we gonna do that? We haven't really talked about what where we're gonna deploy it from.

[Kryten]

NASA's free rides (the ELANA programme) are all through rocket launches; deployment from the ISS is run by the Nanoracks corporation, not NASA. In that case, deployment would be with the standard spring-loaded cubesat deployed, the P-POD.

[K^2]

In either case, the cubesat is deployed with some relative velocity, and its orbit decays much faster than that of a station. So it's not a problem in any case. No propulsion system is strictly necessary.

[Nicholander]

Tough Kryten and oarum, chances are we're going to get deployed on the P-POD.

[Alewx]

Although the idea sounds super exciting, I have to vote against it.

There is already so much junk and debris in LEO that if the community would ever launch a sattelite, than it would have to have a purpose that is bigger than just "we have a sattelite".

[Mr_Brain]

-snip- if the community would ever launch a sattelite, than it would have to have a purpose that is bigger than just "we have a sattelite".

The purpose isn't just "we have a satellite", it is to research the effect of low gravity on plants. Plants in microgravity have been studied on the ISS and obviously in Earth gravity too, but not in the range that will be possible with this Cubesat (by spinning it to create "gravity").

[LvL]

There is already so much junk and debris in LEO that if the community would ever launch a sattelite, than it would have to have a purpose that is bigger than just "we have a sattelite".

Uh, you might have wanted to go through some of the posts where we said we'll put it on a decaying orbit​.

[Alewx]

Uh, you might have wanted to go through some of the posts where we said we'll put it on a decaying orbit​.

I hope you have read all the 100 pages with 939 Posts in detail.....

[Mazon Del]

I hope you have read all the 100 pages with 939 Posts in detail.....

About 4/5ths of the people still talking here at this point have.

Anyways, an update for people on Luis, he is a bit busy until WPI starts up on thursday (I may be taking this friday off as well, we shall see), but he is researching answers to the questions I gave him.

[Nicholander]

Ah, good to hear. Also, K^2, you REALLY need to update the first post to say and explain what our CubeSat has turned into over the near 100 posts. We're in the early sim phase, and it's going to study the effects on plants (And maybe bacteria) in low-g conditions.

[K^2]

Ok. Will do.

[LvL]

Sooooo, have we figured out whether we're gonna be using a 2U or 3U?

[Nicholander]

We're using a 1U, the top half will have the pressurized area with the plants, and the other will have all the systems, navigation, MPUs, communication, etc.

[K^2]

I've always thought of the electronics/nav part as the top half, and payload as the bottom half. Not that it really matters...

Still have a glitch in T' calculation, but at least, my worries over precision are gone. Looks like this is the right way to go about it.

[LvL]

We're using a 1U satellite? How the heck are we gonna fit the experiment, and all of the equipment? With a 1U, we don't have halves. we have an area for the electronics, and nowhere else. If you think that a plant experiment with moss can go into a 1U, plus needing everything to keep it alive for a reasonable​ amount of time...

Edited August 26, 2014 by oarum

[Mazon Del]

To be fair everybody, we are currently planning for a 1U experiment, however if the funding the eventual kickstarter or whatever provides allows for us to reach 2U or 3U size those options will get fair consideration. It is likely that when it is time for the kickstarter we show a few charts, one showing that if the funding we get is greater than X, then we can do a 1U with assorted gear, stretch goal 1 is greater gear for the 1U, stretch goal 2, even better, stretch goal 3 is an upgrade to a 2U. And so on.

Oooh, this line of thinking provides me with an interesting idea. Though far far too early to really begin any sort of discussions with SQUAD about it, I wonder (considering, with their permission of course, the cubesat is going to be slathered in KSP references) if they would be willing to have one of the backer rewards be copies of KSP?

And with regard to if the electronics are on the top or bottom. Remember people, this is space, and that means the enemy gate is down!

Edited August 26, 2014 by Mazon Del

[R0cketC0der]

We're using a 1U satellite? How the heck are we gonna fit the experiment, and all of the equipment? With a 1U, we don't have halves. we have an area for the electronics, and nowhere else. If you think that a plant experiment with moss can go into a 1U, plus needing everything to keep it alive for a reasonable​ amount of time...

Wait... You think that a Phobos mission with a 2U or 3U CubeSat is possible but say it's impossible to do a simple plant study with a 1U CubeSat.

Besides, if you get us the money needed for a 2U or 3U CubeSat launch and the CubeSat itself, then I'm pretty sure everyone will agree with 2U or 3U. But until we know we have the money to build anything larger than 1U, we will design for a 1U, because it is a lot cheaper. We still don't even know whether we are even going to get enough money to launch a 1U CubeSat.

[Mazon Del]

Also, did a bit of research during my lunch break into small microscopes. Turns out there is quite a selection of small and capable microscopes.

$30 handheld model 15-30x zoom (maybe a bit larger than we might want?)

http://tinyurl.com/nt8z47h

$350 for 7-108x zoom! (might generate images of high enough resolution to cause issues with downlinking to earth? Depends on radio.)

http://tinyurl.com/pack7u2