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Space Science

Amateur Mars Satellite 107

Posted by michael from the wing-and-a-prayer dept.
Hobbyspacer writes "The German AMSAT-DL group recently announced formal approval of the Phase 5-A project to send a spacecraft to Mars in the 2007 or 2009 launch window. The spacecraft will use the same structure as AO-40 (formerly Phase 3-D) that was launched into earth orbit in the fall of 2000. Like AO-40 the Mars probe will piggyback on an Ariane 5 launch and use the same 400 N propulsion system. (I expect they will solve the problem that caused the engine misfiring that nearly destroyed the spacecraft.) The Phase 3-E project was also approved to follow up AO-40 and to test various techniques and technologies for the Mars mission. The document P5A-to-Mars!(712k pdf) describes the technical challenges and possible solutions for such an ambitious mission. AO-40 cost several million dollars and the Mars probe should cost considerably more, requiring they obtain funds outside of AMSAT members and the ham radio community. The long list, though, of spectacular contributions made by AMSAT to the development of micro sats and space communications gives the program high credibility."
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Amateur Mars Satellite More

Amateur Mars Satellite

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  • A big leap? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Devil's BSD ( 562630 ) on Sunday August 04, 2002 @12:08AM (#4006773) Homepage
    I think this is kind of a big leap from just a amateur rocket in space earlier this year. What happened to an actual geosynchronous satelite, a lunar probe, or even an amateur manned space shot? I think they should plan these first before they leap into such a project.
    • The satellite is the easy part. The booster is the tricky bit.

      AMSAT groups have been putting satellites in space for years now from the tiny and simple to the complex and large (Oscar Phase IIId). It's like the difference between building aircraft and avionics. Boosters and satellites are two completely different animals.

      This probe will be on a commercial booster in a series with a well proven track record.
    • The ham radio community should be pissed off about this use of funds. NASA needs fields of giant antennas to make out a signal from Mars. How is a ham radio operator going to see any benfit from this? Your suggestions would be much more practcal.
    • What happened to an actual geosynchronous satelite, a lunar probe, or even an amateur manned space shot?

      Remember that we are talking "amateur" as in "amateur radio," not in the more general context of "non-professional." AMSAT as an organization is concerned with launching satellites for the use of amateur radio operators, not with putting a man in space or a probe on the moon.

      I might also point out that the reason why there are no AMSATs in geostationary orbit has more to do with the fact that (useful) geostationary orbital slots are a scarce resource than anything else. AMSAT 3-D was launched into a geosynchronous transfer orbit (presumably as a piggyback on something else going to geosync) but its final orbit is highly elliptical, a useful orbit that is not at all scarce.

      -Isaac

  • ...with all those magnetic bacteria kicking around Mars these days :).
  • i want nothing more than an amatuer, grass-roots, half-assed spare time devotion created rocket to blast me away from this dirty goddamn planet full of hippies!

  • Contamination and porly funded projects (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Speedy8 ( 594486 ) on Sunday August 04, 2002 @12:41AM (#4006846) Journal
    While all of these projects are cool, I wonder if the cheaper projects will have problems with lower standards of cleanliness and lead to contamination of Mars, possibly leading to the destruction of any curent life on Mars. After all Scientists have found that there was contamination on the first lunar lander that touched down on the Moon on 1967.
    • I wonder if the cheaper projects will have problems with lower standards of cleanliness and lead to contamination of Mars

      Just use a PC speaker and special software [slashdot.org]
    • You point isn't without merit, but it seems worth pointing out that any Martian lifeforms should have a tremendous advantage in their native environment.

      The real problem with contamination would probably be that we'd risk a false-positive on the who alien life thing.

      • That may be true, but we have a track record of killing off the indigeounus life forms we meet, dating way back, even as far as invasion of the America's with disease.
        • That's an improper analogy. People of Europe and of the America's were both of the same species, and therefore were both vulnerable to the same diseases, whether they've seen them before or not. However, the Europeans have been exposed to those diseases for a long time, and therefore had a certain level of resistance to it.

          There are likely no common species between Earth and Mars, so even if the probe is contaminated by any terrestrial bacteria/diseases, they will not be designed to infect or otherwise compromise Martian species. Not to say it would be impossible to kill of Martian life with terrestrial organisms, but just that your analogy is fallacious.
          • There are likely no common species between Earth and Mars, so even if the probe is contaminated by any terrestrial bacteria/diseases, they will not be designed to infect or otherwise compromise Martian species. I think you are limiting the scope of the analogy a little too far. The bacteria and disease was able to kill off the common species becase they have a similar envrnments to live in, the human host. While Martian environment is differant to most of Earth, it does have simularities to many places on Earth and we have many single cell organisms that thrive in the conditions simular to that on Mars and may, very easily drowned out the current populations.
    • Heck, man! And here I was about to suggest that they shoot some bacteria and cold-tolerant lichens and moss spores up there -- intentionally!

      I'm all for keeping natural environments untouched when there's a clear reason or there's something we're actually protecting...but what would you suggest is being damaged on the Moon or Mars? And, personally, I find the idea of "contaminating" Luna to be ludicrous. We're not talking intelligent life out there, nor are we talking about nutrient-rich environments. We're barely talking atmosphere. The moon (and, it seems, Mars) are about as close to the true definition of "wasteland" as you can get. And, if we kill off the native Martian unicellular organisms, so be it. I want that place to be well on its way to terraforming by the time I head up there with the first wave of manned flights.

      Best way to get at that all that locked-up water and use that carbon dioxide atmosphere would be to send some tough bacteria, with some of your basic algaes and lichens to start putting down roots...
      • What if the new habitants adapt to extreme cold, populate the polar areas and lock the vital resources (water, CO2) on the poles, and thus hinder further attempt to redistribute those resources closer to the equator, where the climat is more palatable to humans?

        If you nuke a polar cap with CO2, you could get more CO2 in the air. If you nuke a polar cap covered by lichens, you could end up with carbon dust on the poles and CO in the air.

    • Filed at 7:08 p.m. MSNST, August 5, 2033
      AMERICAN QUARTER, MARS RESEARCH BASE (MSNAP) -- MSASA researchers have discovered what appears to be a 2012-model German Sony Aibo in a region of Plateau 148 that was previously believed unexplored.

      The artificial dog had a spent CO2 cannister strapped to its back and flexible solar panels in place of floppy ears.

      "Basically, we're thinking this is probably the work of some amateur who thought it would be fun to illegally land on Mars before we got here," Mars Station Director Johnson said. "We are currently swabbing the dog for fingerprints and have been assured the full cooperation of the German police force in bringing this criminal to justice."

      According to initial reports, researchers first thought they had encountered an intelligent extra-terrestrial life form but lost interest when it didn't seem to understand English. A week later, a team carrying a German exchange scientist encountered the Aibo and was able to make it sit up, beg, and sing the Sony Anthem in German.

      The minimum penalty for sending your own property to another planet without MSASA permission is 3 years confinement on the roving Lunar Prison, which is designed to remain on the dark side of the moon at all times.

      "I'd like to remind everyone," Director Johnson said, "that you can't go around sending things to other planets. This isn't a joke. Leave this serious business of interplanetary travel to the professionals."

      • Fine joke, except: There is no *dark* side of the moon; the moon's rotation locks one side to the earth, not to the sun, so the *far* side of the moon gets as much sunlight as the near side.

        • Pedantics aside, I'd guess that's why it was a ROVING prison, it moves on a lunar surface, escaping dawn so it always stays on whatever is dark side at the moment. Days and nights at Moon are so long that it wouldn't even have to move very fast.
          • The moon's diameter is 3476 km. The circumference therefore is 3476 x Pi = 10920 km. One moon day lasts 28 earth days, therefore the prison would have to travel 10920 km in 28 earth days to stay in the night part, which equals 390 km in one earth day or about 16 km/h, which is hardly feasible for any vehicle given the rocky mountainous terrain.
            • Have you considered the fact that "the roving prison" doesn't have to be on the equator? You should be ashamed :-)
              • Have you considered the fact that "the roving prison" doesn't have to be on the equator? You should be ashamed :-)

                Won't work. Think how to stay out of sunlight on the earth for three years....would staying at the North/South Pole work? Would circling around it work?

    • First, the thing will get to spend at least a year in space before it orbits Mars. Vaccumm and extreme temperatures are very good at sterilizing anything left living. Second, it's not going to land.

      But I do remember those pictures of Bdale without the face mask in Kouru. It seems they didn't have one that fit him.

      Bruce

    • After all Scientists have found that there was
      contamination on the first lunar lander that
      touched down on the Moon on 1967.

      Yeah, and look what happened to that lush, green
      planet!
  • It took me three times, reading the summary to realize that they actually *are* planning a mission to the *planet* Mars, and that they are not putting up a bird to help out the Military Affiliate Radio System, aka MARS [marsgateway.net]. It still makes more sense that it's a MARS bird - who'll be *on* Mars to use it? But there is (admittedly slight) a chance that this could prove useful here around Earth, if all Hades breaks loose with terrorists.

    73 de NNN0WYZ
    • Who would use it? Amateur Radio operators have been doing satellite and "moonbounce" (using the Moon as a communications satellite by bouncing radio signals off it) communications for decades. It would be a whole new technical challenge to make contact via a satellite in Mars orbit. Not to mention the accomplishment of just getting a non-government spacecraft to Mars. The Physics to do this are well-known.

      They'll undoubtedly also get some funding from universities who would like to put research payloads on the spacecraft. For example, AMSAT's P3D/AO-40 satellite carried a research payload from NASA (to map GPS reception from above the GPS satellites.) since it was going into a highly-elliptical "Molniya" orbit that NASA didn't have any birds in.
      • I'm well aware of both satellite and moonbounce. I used to do satellite, and after finding out that moonbounce took major power and a huge aluminum farm, to do CW at a pre-established time and frequency with somebody you knew ... well, to me it was mainly an exercise in futility. Why even try if you already know who you'll talk to, what you'll say and when you'll say it?

        Somehow, talking via a satellite around Mars seems like that, cubed. Count me out. I was into this to learn electronics, and to meet new people, not to prove that I have the most disposable income.
      • If indeed AMSAT does this, who will be the winner
        of the Mars Cup [acutally, it is the Elser-Mathes
        Cup]?

        Actually heats up the race!

  • I'd give the project lik $20 or so if they would place a BIG sign on mars, readable from orbit, that says:
    <Power to The User> [dnsart.com]

    Then again, they would probably misfire, and I would be out $20, unless they refund donations.

  • Here's hoping that they don't mix up Kilometers with Miles.


  • Amature brain surgery?

  • Amateur != neophyte (Score:5, Informative)

    by pongo000 ( 97357 ) on Sunday August 04, 2002 @01:57AM (#4006980)
    Seems like there's a lot of misconceptions about what the word "amateur" means. Amateur radio is named for its non-commercial nature (amateur as opposed to professional), and has nothing to do with level of competence. There are a great number of amateur radio operators who are experts in their fields of endeavor, and can hardly be considered "amateur" in terms of competence. Here's a list of some of the more famous amateurs. [geocities.com] I see a Nobel Prize winner in physics on there, which I'd hardly consider "amateur."

    • And to add fuel to the fire - by definition all new ideas are proposed by amateurs. It's only after things have setteled down, do the professionals stands atop the pioneers and pronouce themselves clever.

    • *SPLAT* ... and the link above is already slashdotted... :-(

      Regards, Ulli

  • Wow, that's one hell of a DX contact.

    73 DE KE6ISF

  • Calling Mars... (Score:3, Funny)

    by SEWilco ( 27983 ) on Sunday August 04, 2002 @03:00AM (#4007098) Journal
    "CQ Mars...CQ Mars..."
    "Mars is on the other side of the Sun, wait a few months"
    "I'm working the bounce off Saturn."
    "Oh. Any luck?"
    "Won't know until morning. Light speed delay."
  • Does this mean that the award cup on display
    at ARRL HQ for the first QSO with mars will
    finally be awarded to someone?

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