[amsat-bb] Re: ANDE-2 Deployment

[Ivan Galysh]

The reason for the heavy mass is to support the atmospheric drag  
study. The satellites are near perfect spheres, I think 32 micron  
roughness. Castor is stuffed pretty tight with electronics, and  
instruments and still was not enough. There are 112 D cell Lithium  
batteries stuffed in there.

Pollux is lighter and actually had to have the shells thinned a bit to  
meet the lower mass requirement and has only 28 D cells. The cells are  
19 AH lithium primary cells.

Since power is very limited, stuffing it with electronics was not an  
option. Castor needs to run on batteries for a year while Pollux 6  
months. Pollux is expected to reenter in a little less than 6 months.  
Castor will come back in a year.

Ivan

On Jul 29, 2009, at 5:33 PM, Joe wrote:

> Ok,
>
> The next question is then,,  WHY?  when all we ever hear all the  
> time is
> Bitch ,, Bitch,, BITCH,,, about the high cost per pound to get  
> something
> into orbit?
>
> Here again,  instead of thick shell,  why not pack in some useful
> electronics?
>
> DUH?
>
> Joe WB9SBD
>
> Ivan Galysh wrote:
>
>> The hemispheres are about 1/2 inch thick solid aluminum. It's built  
>> to
>> be heavy.
>>
>> Ivan
>>
>>
>> Joe wrote:
>>
>>
>>> Pretty cool,
>>>
>>> But Ok I see what is all in this thing,  but holy cow,,, what is  
>>> in it
>>> that makes it weigh 140 POUNDS!!! a 19" sphere,  wow!
>>>
>>> Joe WB9SBD
>>>
>>> g7iii at g7iii.net wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>> Hi Joe,
>>>>
>>>> You Wrote:
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>> have any idea as to what the telemetry may consist of?
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>> Telemetry is documented on the website Bob referenced, on each
>>>> Satellite's own page, see:
>>>>
>>>> https://goby.nrl.navy.mil/ANDE/Castor.html and
>>>> https://goby.nrl.navy.mil/ANDE/Pollux.html
>>>>
>>>> TX is on 145.825, so any Satgate should pick them up and transfer
>>>> the data to APRS-IS.
>>>>
>>>> I suppose I should go update my APRS/PCSAT/PCSAT2/ANDE telemetry  
>>>> decoder
>>>> now. Wish I'd realised these were going to be this "open" earlier  
>>>> *mutter*.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> 73s
>>>>
>>>> Iain
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>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
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>>
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