Space & Astronomy/Space and Astronomy (October 1993).iso/mac/TEXT/SPACEDIG/V13_1/V13_135.TXT

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Subject: SPACE Digest V13 #135

SPACE Digest                                     Volume 13 : Issue 135

Today's Topics:
           Pioneer Venus Update - 02/01/91
              Re: Why man rate?
         NASA Headline News for 02/04/91 (Forwarded)
              Re: Solar Impact Mission.
             MOL expiration date
           ASTRA (was: Re: Solar Impact Mission. )
  Re: Request for Feedback on Proposed Lunar Analog Robotics Contest
              Space event in California

Administrivia:

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Date: 4 Feb 91 04:23:30 GMT
From: zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!usc!elroy.jpl.nasa.gov!jato!mars.jpl.nasa.gov![e-mail]  (Ron Baalke)
Organization: Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, CA.
Subject: Pioneer Venus Update - 02/01/91
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                    PIONEER VENUS STATUS REPORT
                         February 1, 1991

     The Project will request a "short loop" configuration at the DSS's (Deep
Space Stations) prior to critical commanding of the Pioneer Venus spacecraft.
This was done to avoid the frequent CPA (Command Processor Assembly) failures
which have affected the commanding.

     On January 24, the spin period was adjusted from 12.95 seconds to 13.15
seconds.  During 70 meter supports, the bit rate will be raised to 2048 bps.
Long eclipse season #20 begins on February 12 and will last through February
20.

     Pioneer Venus-1 (sometimes referred at Pioneer 12) was launched on a
Atlas-Centaur rocket on May 20, 1978 and arrived into orbit around Venus on
December 4, 1978.  In July 1980, controllers stopped using hydrazine to hold
the spacecraft's perigee steady.  In 1986, Pioneer Venus made ultraviolet
observations of Halley's Comet.  In August, 1990, as Magellan was making its
burn for Venus orbit insertion, Pioneer Venus attempted to observe the burn,
but was unsucessful.  In Januray 1991, the Approach Phase of Venus entry began.
This phase will last until May 1992 and will see the periapsis drop from about
1000 km to 200 km.  In the spring of this year, the radar mapper, which has
been off since 1981, will be turned back on to map the southern region of
Venus.  In June 1992, the Entry Phase will begin and the remaining hydrazine
aboard the spacecraft will be used for 90 days to delay the entry into Venus.
Burnup of Pioneer Venus is expected to happen in September 1992.
      ___    _____     ___
     /_ /|  /____/ \  /_ /|      Ron Baalke         | [e-mail]
     | | | |  __ \ /| | | |      Jet Propulsion Lab |
  ___| | | | |__) |/  | | |___   M/S 301-355        | It's 10PM, do you know
 /___| | | |  ___/    | |/__ /|  Pasadena, CA 91109 | where your spacecraft is?
 |_____|/  |_|/       |_____|/                      | We do!

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Date: 2 Feb 91 04:51:59 GMT
From: zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!caen!umich!dgsi![e-mail]  (Greg Cronau)
Organization: Cimage Corp, Ann Arbor, MI
Subject: Re: Why man rate?
References: <[e-mail]>, <[e-mail]>, <[e-mail]>
Sender: [e-mail]
To: [e-mail]

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] writes:
>In article <[e-mail]>, [e-mail] (Glenn A. Serre) writes...
>>In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (David Cornutt) writes:
>
>>3) The Titan II was man-rated, and the Titan IV is a Titan II that's been
>>modded.
>
>Not that I have anything against Titans, but why was it man-rated? Did
>they ever expect to launch capsules?
>
>Craig Cole
>[e-mail]
>[e-mail]

????
Uh, yeah, like say Gemini 2,3,4,5,6,7,8,etc. for instance.

[e-mail]

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Date: 5 Feb 91 01:28:48 GMT
From: trident.arc.nasa.gov![e-mail]  (Peter E. Yee)
Organization: NASA Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, CA
Subject: NASA Headline News for 02/04/91 (Forwarded)
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             Headline News
Internal Communications Branch (P-2) NASA Headquarters

  Monday, February 4, 1991    Audio Service: 202 / 755-1788

This is NASA Headline News for Monday, February 4, 1991

NASA Administrator Richard Truly, Deputy Administrator J.R.
Thompson, and Comptroller Thomas Campbell will brief the
press on the Fiscal Year 1992 NASA Budget request today
at 2:30 pm in the NASA Headquarters auditorium.  A summary
of the budget request will be distributed at the beginning of the
press conference.  The briefing will be televised live on NASA
Select TV.

The Office of Space Flight will also distribute a new manifest
following the briefing.

  * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Over the weekend, technicians at the Kennedy Space Center
installed the final of three replacement thrusters on
Discovery.  The thrusters have been tested and leak checked.
The only anomaly found was a non-working heater on one of the
thrusters.  Troubleshooting on that heater and its circuit are
currently underway.  Technicians also replaced three filters in
the waste water dump system.  The filters were found to be in
various stages of natural deterioration.  The flight readiness
review for Discovery's March Department of Defense mission is
now set for Feb. 21 at KSC.

Work on Atlantis continues on schedule to meet that orbiter's
planned April launch for the STS-37 Gamma Ray Observatory
deploy mission.  The forward reaction control system was
installed over the weekend, as was the right orbital
maneuvering system pod.  The electrical and mechanical
systems flight readiness test on main engine #2 is now
scheduled for Wednesday.  Engine #2 had a malfunctioning
computer controller which was replaced last week.  The crew
equipment interface test is scheduled for Saturday, Feb. 9.  The
STS-37 flight crew will fly in from Houston for that test.
Atlantis' external tank is being mated to the solid rocket
booster stack in the Vehicle Assembly Building today.

Workers in the VAB continue to install thermal protection in the
area of Columbia's main gear doors while that orbiter awaits
Discovery's spot in Orbiter Processing Facility Bay 1.

  * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Orbiting Venus, 142 million miles distant, Magellan and its
radar system continue to perform normally.  All recent star
calibrations and momentum wheel desaturations have been
successful.  The temperature of Magellan's battery #1 went
above its alarm limit of 20 degrees Celsius several times during
the past few days.  A reset command was sent to the spacecraft
to change the heater limitations, and that successfully brought
the temperature down to the desired range.  At present, only the
B-side tape recorder is being used to store mapping data until
the data is transmitted to Earth stations.  A spacecraft analysis
team is still investigating the problem on the A-side recorder.




Former United Kingdom Prime Minister Margaret
Thatcher visits the Jet Propulsion Laboratory today.  Mrs.
Thatcher will be briefed on the accomplishments of the Voyager
I and II missions and shown the Deep Space Network control
facility.  Project managers from the Magellan, Galileo and
Ulysses projects will also brief her on the current status and
discoveries of these missions.



Here's the broadcast schedule for Public Affairs events on NASA
Select TV.  All times are Eastern.  **indicates a live program.

Monday, 2/4/91

     2:30 pm    **NASA FY 1992 Budget press briefing from NASA
            Headquarters.

Tuesday, 2/5/91
    12:00 pm    NASA Productions will be transmitted.


All events and times may change without notice.  This report is
filed daily, Monday through Friday, at 12:00 pm, EST.  It is a
service of Internal Communications Branch at NASA
Headquarters.  Contact:  CREDMOND on NASAmail or at
202/453-8425.


NASA Select TV:  Satcom F2R, Transponder 13, C-Band, 72
degrees West Longitude, Audio 6.8, Frequency 3960 MHz.

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Date: 4 Feb 91 17:28:46 GMT
From: usc!cs.utexas.edu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!utzoo![e-mail]  (Henry Spencer)
Organization: U of Toronto Zoology
Subject: Re: Solar Impact Mission.
References: <[e-mail]>, <[e-mail]>
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In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Christopher Neufeld) writes:
>>Why isnt it possible to cancel the orbital velocity via a close flyby
>>of mercury...
>   Two reasons I can think of off-hand. First, you've already done a lot
>of the work if you've dropped your orbit to that of Mercury. It costs
>less in delta-v to go to Jupiter than it does to go to Mercury...

However, you can reduce that somewhat by doing what Mariner 10 did:  use a
Venus gravity assist.  Chris's second point, though, remains valid:  you
can't do a very tight turn around Mercury, because its gravitational field
is not very strong even just above its surface.

For really tight turns, what you want is a waverider design that can fly
at high hypersonic speeds in an atmosphere.  Then you can do a right-angle
turn or even a 180 around any planet with a substantial atmosphere, e.g.
Venus.  Aerodynamic forces do a much better job of holding you down during
the turn than gravity.  This also lets you use Mars rather than Jupiter
for outer-planets missions, which is nice because Jupiter's Van Allen belts
are a major hassle for Jupiter gravity assists.
--
"Maybe we should tell the truth?"      | Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
"Surely we aren't that desperate yet." |  [e-mail]   utzoo!henry

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

Date: 4 Feb 91 19:28:53 GMT
From: world!ksr![e-mail]  (Chris Jones)
Subject: MOL expiration date

In article <[e-mail]>, henry@zoo (Henry Spencer) writes:
>     MOL was cancelled long after Apollo got the go-ahead; I believe the
>first lunar landing was imminent when MOL died.  (Don't remember exact dates.)

MOL was cancelled in June 1969, when the first moon landing was, indeed, pretty
darn imminent.
--
Chris Jones    [e-mail]    {world,uunet,harvard}!ksr!clj

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Date:     Tue,  5 Feb 91 13:47 CDT
From: Bill Higgins-- Beam Jockey <[e-mail]>
Subject:  ASTRA (was: Re: Solar Impact Mission. )
To: [e-mail], [e-mail]
Original_To:  SPACE,gov%"[e-mail]",
          edu%"[e-mail]"

In reply to a question by Eric Michael Slimko
([e-mail]), Peter Scott ([e-mail])
wrote:

>>Anyone in netland doing any research with high
>> velocity waveriders?

>Doubt that he's on the net, but Duncan Lunan was big on this when
>he gave a seminar on the topic here a few years ago.  He was with
>an organization that was planning scale tests, off the coast of
>Scotland I believe.  Wonder what happened to them?

My mailing list is starting to rust, but a couple years ago I had this
address for Lunan's pals, ASTRA:

ASSOCIATION IN SCOTLAND TO RESEARCH INTO ASTRONOMICS  Phone: [phone]
ASTRA c/o Campbell, 16 Oakfield Avenue, Hillhead, Glasgow G12 8JE,
   United Kingdom

Don't know who Campbell might be.  ASTRA was pretty inexpensive to
join, as I recall-- in 1988 it was five pounds per year.  Or do they
say "poonds?" You get a modest newsletter.  I believe ASTRA has
recently joined the National Space Society as a chapter.

Yes, they have done low-speed tests of waverider models. One of their
members was an aerodynamics boffin named Nonweiler who worked out
waverider principles. ASTRA is a bunch of space advocates who have met
for years around Glasgow.  In particular, they've brainstormed
interesting scenarios for long-term space development and the growth
of a solar-system-wide economy (I think that's what they mean by
"astronomics.")  Lunan discusses them in some of his books.

Now, it seems to me that *some* member of ASTRA must read this
newsgroup over on JANET somewhere.  Speak up!

                                    Bill Higgins
Engineer of Hijacked Train:
"Is this a holdup?"                 Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory

Masked Gunman:                      Bitnet: [e-mail]
(Hesitates, looks at partner,
looks at engineer again)            SPAN/Hepnet/Physnet: 43011::HIGGINS
"It's a science experiment!"
                                    Internet: [e-mail]

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Date: 6 Feb 91 00:15:47 GMT
From: deccrl!news.crl.dec.com!shlump.nac.dec.com!sousa.enet.dec.com!sndpit.enet.dec.com![e-mail]  (Willie Smith)
Organization: Digital Equipment Corporation
Subject: Re: Request for Feedback on Proposed Lunar Analog Robotics Contest
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In article <[e-mail]>,
  [e-mail] (John Winans) writes...
>
>I have been reading this thread with some interest.  And have wondered about
>the remote-controlled "categories".  The origional note mentioned the use
>of cellular phones and ham radio to communicate with the robots.  Since we
>all know that radio works and we COULD use it if we wanted to pay for it,
>why not allow (or create a category) that would allow a looooooooonnggg wire
>to be used instead?

Not a bad idea!  I figure that by the end of this year, my costs for radio
gear ought to be about half of the total vehicle costs.  I personally don't
want to deal with tethers, but to each his own.

>Hmmm  If there was SOME standardization in the format used, the sponsor of
>the event could also provide an error generator that could inject errors into
>the communication system (like interrupt video signals, pop bit errors into
>the standard serial communications formats etc...).
>
>This might even up the competition a little bit as well.

Not really, as the AX.25 data that runs over ham radio packet links is
error corrected - either you get all the data error-free or the link goes
down and you get nothing.  I suppose you could mess up the video, but
that's going to be about the same effect, either it's usable and the Waldo
team wipes the floor with you all :+) or it's not and no-one gets any work
done....

Willie Smith
[e-mail]
[e-mail]
{Usenet!Backbone}!decwrl!sndpit.enet.dec.com!smith

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Date: 5 Feb 91 17:27:10 GMT
From: wuarchive!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!swrinde!elroy.jpl.nasa.gov!zardoz.cpd.com!dhw68k!ofa123![e-mail]  (David Anderman)
Organization: Universal Electronics Inc.
Subject: Space event in California
Sender: [e-mail]
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On Saturday, February 16th, at 9am, the southern California chapters of
the National Space Society and the California Space Development
Conference will sponsor a special workshop on space activism. The event
will be held at the McDonnell-Douglas Oceanus Facility, located at 5301
Oceanus Drive, Huntington Beach, and is open to the general public.
Admission is $7. Attendees at the event will learn how to promote space
development through the National Space Society chapter system.

Also scheduled during the workshop are a tour of the full-scale space
station mockup at the facility and a talk by Congressman Dana
Rohrabacher on space activism within Congress.

For more information about this event, please contact your local NSS
chapter:

OASIS (Los Angeles)                 213/374-1381
San Diego L5                        619/295-3690
Riverside/San Bernardino        714/689-3306
Orange County                        714/842-9878
Ventura County                        805/647-8592



--
David Anderman
Internet: [e-mail]
Compuserve: >internet:[e-mail]
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End of SPACE Digest V13 #135
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