Space & Astronomy/Space and Astronomy (October 1993).iso/mac/TEXT/SPACEDIG/V12_4/V12_488.TXT

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Subject: SPACE Digest V12 #488

SPACE Digest                                     Volume 12 : Issue 488

Today's Topics:
        Some interesting SSME specifications.
              Magellan Update - 10/24/90
              Pioneer 11 article
            Re: Galileo Update - 10/19/90
            Re: Pioneer 11 article
              Re: Launch cost per pound
              Re: Launch cost per pound
             Re: Theories needed on life
              Magellan Update - 10/23/90
              Re: SPACE Digest V11 #430

Administrivia:

    Submissions to the SPACE Digest/sci.space should be mailed to
  [e-mail].  Other mail, esp. [un]subscription notices,
  should be sent to [e-mail], or, if urgent, to
             [e-mail]

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

Date: 9 Oct 90 16:41:51 GMT
From: hpfcso!hpldola!hp-lsd!frisbee![e-mail]  (Matt Taylor)
Subject: Some interesting SSME specifications.

One of our mechanical engineers used to be on the SSME team at
Rocketdyne and has a lot of PR memos which he brings in from time to
time.  Although somewhat dated (1977 he says), I thought it to be of
enough interest to post.  (All grammar/spelling mistakes are mine).

[ On a related note, wasn't there supposed to be a beefed up
version of the current SSME due to be incorporated into the shuttle
sometime soon? ]

============================================================

                      DID YOU KNOW???

The Rocketdyne Space Shuttle Main Engine operates at greater
temperature  extremes  than  any mechanical system in common
use today.  The fuel, liquified hydrogen at -423 F,  is  the
second  coldest  liquid  on earth.  When the liquid hydrogen
and liquid oxygen are combusted, the temperature in the main
combustion  chamber is 6000 F, higher than the boiling point
of iron.

                         * * * * *

Even though  the  complete  Rocketdyne  Space  Shuttle  Main
Engine  weighs  one-seventh  as  much as one railroad diesel
engine, the SSME high pressure fuel pump  delivers  as  much
horsepower  as 28 diesel locomotives while the high pressure
oxidizer pump delivers enough power for 11 more.

                         * * * * *

The energy released by the three  Rocketdyne  Space  Shuttle
Main  Engines  at  full  power  level, in units of watts, is
equivalent to the output of 23 Hoover Dams.

                         * * * * *

If water were pumped at the rate fuel is pumped by the three
Rocketdyne  Space  Shuttle  Main Engines, an average family-
size swimming pool could be emptied  in  25  seconds.   This
pump develops a pressure equal to that experienced by a sub-
marine if it were three miles deep.

                         * * * * *

The Rocketdyne Space  Shuttle  Main  Engine  fuel  turbopump
weighs  approximately the same as the V-8 engine of a modern
automobile but develops 310 times the brake horsepower.

                         * * * * *

The Rocketdyne Space  Shuttle  Main  Engine  fuel  turbopump
develops as much torque as 18 V-8 automobile engines.

                         * * * * *

If one Rocketdyne Space Shuttle Main Engine could be  scaled
down  so  that  it  weighed less than three pounds, it could
develop enough thrust to lift a grown man.

                         * * * * *

The combine full power level horsepower of the high pressure
fuel  and oxidizer pumps of only two of the three Rocketdyne
Space Shuttle Main Engines that will propel the Space  Shut-
tle  is  more  than  adequate to operate a 91,700 ton-Nimitz
class aircraft carrier at cruising speed.

                         * * * * *

The fuel and oxidizer pumps of the  three  Rocketdyne  Space
Shuttle  Main  Engines  at full power level could propel the
battleship Iowa and have enough power left over to cruise an
additional 12 Ethan Allen class submarines.  The engines are
designed to supply this power for almost four hours  without
overhaul if enough propellant were supplied.

                         * * * * *

One Rocketdyne Space Shuttle Main  Engine  generates  suffi-
cient  thrust  to  maintain  the  flight of two and one-half
747s, the aircraft being used for Shuttle captive tests  and
scheduled for use in ferry operations.

                         * * * * *

The combustion of the propellants of  the  three  Rocketdyne
Space  Shuttle Main Engines operating at full power releases
energy at a rate greater than that produced by the  combined
foreign nuclear power plants in nine countries.

                         * * * * *

The power developed by the combustions or propellants in the
Rocketdyne Space Shuttle Main Engine operating at full power
is almost five times the rate of that  to  be  generated  by
seven nuclear plants being activated in the United States in
1977.
--
----------------------------------------------------------
Matt Taylor @ Maximum Storage, Inc.        A haven for WORMs.
Colorado Springs, CO.  719-531-6888
{cbosgd,handel,hao,hplabs}!hp-lsd!frisbee!matt

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

Date: 24 Oct 90 18:55:45 GMT
From: elroy.jpl.nasa.gov!jato!mars.jpl.nasa.gov![e-mail]  (Ron Baalke)
Subject: Magellan Update - 10/24/90


                    MAGELLAN STATUS REPORT
                      October 24, 1990

     The Magellan spacecraft continues to map Venus and has completed its
287th mapping orbit.  The 7 STARCALS (star calibrations) and 2 DESATS
(desaturations of the reaction wheels) of the past 24 hours were performed
with nominal attitude updates.  Two star rejections were noted.  A temperature
sensor on the thermal blanket covering one of the propulsion modules has
failed.

     The signal-to-noise ratio of the high rate telemetry at X-band is 3.5 db.
The Sun-earth-Magellan angle is now 2.5 degrees.

     Mapping sequence M0297 was successfully sent to the spacecraft and is
presently executing.  This sequence will automatically stop mapping on
Monday, October 29, if no further commands are uploaded.

     The present mapping sequence switched from track 2 to track 4 of tape
recorder A.  This appears to have greatly improved the rate of zero-filled data
frames.  A software change in the SAR (Synthetic Aperture Radar) data
processor has been devised and tested which will alleviate the problem of
zero-filled frames.

     Fifteen new image swaths were processed yesterday, bringing to 180 the
number of full resolution image swaths.
      ___    _____     ___
     /_ /|  /____/ \  /_ /|
     | | | |  __ \ /| | | |      Ron Baalke         | [e-mail]
  ___| | | | |__) |/  | | |___   Jet Propulsion Lab | [e-mail]
 /___| | | |  ___/    | |/__ /|  M/S 301-355        |
 |_____|/  |_|/       |_____|/   Pasadena, CA 91109 |

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

Date: 22 Oct 90 17:48:49 GMT
From: swrinde!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!usc!elroy.jpl.nasa.gov!jato!mars.jpl.nasa.gov![e-mail]  (Ron Baalke)
Subject: Pioneer 11 article

Space News -- Week of Oct. 22. - Oct. 28
"Pioneer Mission May Be Near End"

"NASA's Pioneer 11 spacecraft, the first satellite to visit
Saturn, is suffering serious communications problems three
billion miles from Earth that threaten to end its historic 17-
year mission."

The paper says that until Oct. 18, ground controllers at the Jet
Propulsion Laboratory had been unable to send any commands to the
craft for two weeks.  The report says a successful command last
week switched the spacecraft from science mode to engineering
mode, enabling it to send more useful data to its Earth-bound
controllers.

The story quotes NASA Ames Research Center Pioneer project chief
Richard Fimmell as saying "if this condition can't be cleaned up,
the mission is over as far as science is concerned."
      ___    _____     ___
     /_ /|  /____/ \  /_ /|
     | | | |  __ \ /| | | |      Ron Baalke         | [e-mail]
  ___| | | | |__) |/  | | |___   Jet Propulsion Lab | [e-mail]
 /___| | | |  ___/    | |/__ /|  M/S 301-355        |
 |_____|/  |_|/       |_____|/   Pasadena, CA 91109 |

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

Date: 22 Oct 90 22:31:34 GMT
From: mcsun!ukc!harrier.ukc.ac.uk![e-mail]  (H.A.Shaw)
Subject: Re: Galileo Update - 10/19/90

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Ron Baalke) writes:
>                          GALILEO STATUS REPORT
>                            October 19, 1990
>     A NO-OP command was sent on October 15 to reset the Command Loss Timer
>to 264 hours, the planned value for this mission phase.
   *   *   *
>All actions were successfully completed and a NO-OP command was sent to reset
>the Command Loss Timer to 216 hours, the planned value for this mission phase.

I have to design the comms. for a scientific package on the MARS-94 mission.  I
have been told that in the up and down link it is possible for things to get
lost and even for packets to be reversed in time order (although I assume a
single data frame, or packet, is atomic).  Is the Command Loss Timer a
timestamp to get around this, and if it is how is it done?  I have to post
because I have posting rights at UKC, but not direct mail.  (seems the wrong
way around to me!!)  Please reply by mail and I will see if I can get special
permission to mail back if need be.
As ever thanks for any help (BTW: thanks to everyone who has mailed me over the
past few weeks with regard to various questions.  I can't reply directly, but
I just want to say thanks.  It great that the system works, and you really can
"talk" to people who actually know!).

Email: [e-mail]                         | Howard Allan Shaw.
                                             | The Unit for Space Science.
Phone: [phone] Extn: 3785             | Room 165, Physics Laboratory,
                                             | The University,
                                             | Canterbury, England.  CT2 7NZ

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

Date: 22 Oct 90 18:52:18 GMT
From: cs.utexas.edu!wuarchive!rex!rouge![e-mail]  (Fraering Philip)
Subject: Re: Pioneer 11 article

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Ron Baalke) writes:

.The story quotes NASA Ames Research Center Pioneer project chief
.Richard Fimmell as saying "if this condition can't be cleaned up,
.the mission is over as far as science is concerned."

I thought there were plans to use the probe as a dumb radiosonde to test for
the presence of gravitational sources like Planet X, etc... by tracking
the telemetry. Even if nothing else works, it can still go -beep- -beep-
-beep-, right?

Phil Fraering
[e-mail]

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

Date: 23 Oct 90 21:02:11 GMT
From: hub.ucsb.edu!ucsbuxa![e-mail]  (Charles Frank Radley)
Subject: Re: Launch cost per pound

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

Date: Tue, 23 Oct 90 07:33:04 EST
From: ksr!ksr.com![e-mail]

To: uunet!hub.ucsb.edu![e-mail] (Charles Frank Radley)

Subject: Re: Launch cost per pound

Reply-To: [e-mail]

Date: Tue, 23 Oct 90 10:21:42 -0400

From: Chris Jones <[e-mail]>





 From:  uunet!hub.ucsb.edu!3001crad%ucsbuxa (Charles Frank Radley)



  Date: Mon, 22 Oct 90 15:40:17 PDT

  [R]ight now the problem about any US company or person doing business

K  with the  Soviet launcher people is that it is simply illegal..........

K  State Department regulations based on the Munitions Control Act

K  prohibit US techn{logy transfer to the Soviets, and all requests

K  by the Soviets to fly US hardware have been denied;  with one

K  exception, Payload Systems flew a small experiment on Mir, and the

K  Commerce Department approved an Export License much to the annoyance of

K  the  State Department, who will make sure that it will not happen again.

K  The Chinese, on the other hand, are allowed to fly Western payloads.

K  You figure that one out and explain it to me.

K

+Clearly, things have to change.  I hope things are moving in the right

+direction.  I expect that the US is not the only source of paying +customers or Kthe Soviet Union, so they may get to turn their launchers +into a money-making Kbusiness without us.  If they continue to move toward +a market economy, it Kseems they will have to price their services +"sensibly", and if that cost turns Kout to be a bargain compared to other

+sources, it would be a shame for Kcustomers to be denied the opportunity +to use them (and it would raise Kinteresting questions about how market-+driven our rocket manufacturing Kcompanies are).

+Chris Jones    [e-mail]    {world,uunet,harvard}!ksr!clj

/g/3001/crad/

-

Change is overdue.    The Soviets have asked how many students do they have

to shoot before they receive Most Favored Nation trading status.  I guess it requires the Soviet military to agree to dismantle the Strategic Deterrent, I wish they would bloody well hurry up and stop prolonging their agony. I predict that once Westerners are allowed to use Soviet rockets, which are proven, cheap and reliable (one Zenit explosion worries me less than one Shuttle explosion !) it will dramatically change the shape of the world's space business..........for the better.

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

Date: 23 Oct 90 21:56:52 GMT
From: wuarchive!cs.utexas.edu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!utgpu!utzoo![e-mail]  (Henry Spencer)
Subject: Re: Theories needed on life

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Daniel Mocsny) writes:
>But the human form is not especially adapted for maximum mechanical
>performance in any environment that I know. Humans seem to succeed
>because they are so adaptable...

As John W. Campbell pointed out a number of years ago, this is actually
selling Homo Sapiens a bit short.  Human physical performance in fact is
very impressive, when considered in areas where it doesn't massively
compromise our versatility.  We can't run as fast as a cheetah, but fast
sprinting is all a cheetah can do.  Endurance, on the other hand, does
not require massive specialization... and humans can and did (as of a
few years ago, still do) hunt things like antelope by chasing them until
they drop from exhaustion.
--
The type syntax for C is essentially   | Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
unparsable.             --Rob Pike     |  [e-mail]   utzoo!henry

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

Date: 24 Oct 90 16:00:00 GMT
From: sunc.osc.edu!malgudi!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!sdd.hp.com!elroy.jpl.nasa.gov!jato!mars.jpl.nasa.gov![e-mail]  (Ron Baalke)
Subject: Magellan Update - 10/23/90


                     MAGELLAN STATUS REPORT
                        October 23, 1990

     The Magellan spacecraft has completed 280 mapping orbits of Venus. The
spacecraft and radar systems are performing well. The slight solar panel
oscillation is continuing and may be jiggling the tape recorder but the
condition does not pose a risk to the mission. Star calibrations and momentum
wheel desaturations were performed without difficulty.

     The Deep Space Network continues to receive S-band telemetry through its
70 meter stations even though loss of the signal was predicted for last
Saturday because of the approach of Superior Conjunction, with the sun nearly
between the planets.

     The weekly radar mapping command sequence and parameter files were
uploaded to carry the mission through superior conjunction.

     A total of 165 mapping orbits have been processed. As of Monday,
October 22, more than 98 percent of the orbits mapped had been successfully
transmitted back to Earth. The Altimetry/Radiometry team at MIT had processed
140 orbits of altimetry data.
      ___    _____     ___
     /_ /|  /____/ \  /_ /|
     | | | |  __ \ /| | | |      Ron Baalke         | [e-mail]
  ___| | | | |__) |/  | | |___   Jet Propulsion Lab | [e-mail]
 /___| | | |  ___/    | |/__ /|  M/S 301-355        |
 |_____|/  |_|/       |_____|/   Pasadena, CA 91109 |

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

Date: Wed, 24 Oct 90 19:50:11 EST
From: DREAD <[e-mail]>
Subject: Re: SPACE Digest V11 #430

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

End of SPACE Digest V12 #488
*******************