>Why not take the awaiting ARISSAT engineering units already built and put >a known battery in one of them? Uh Oh, Gould's stomach is growling--HA! >Dee >
I know some of you are just having fun, but some really think it's just this easy. Let me sprinkle a little reality here. Vega offered a free launch to EUROPEAN educational CUBESAT projects. Since some of the ones chosen failed to meet the deadline for delivery, had a EUROPEAN group had a 1U cubesat ready to fly, it might have had a chance. The remaining ARISSats have no deployment system, meaning no way to hold it to the rocket, and no way to turn it on, unless someone wants to ride along to flip the three switches and sling it out upon command. Furthermore, ARISSat is volume-wise as large as the two primary payloads, LARES and ALMAsat, and has roughly 50 times the mass of either of the missing cubesats. Fox-1 (and presumably FunCube?) will have more than one flight-capable model built. Fox-1 plans four total, at least two ready to fly, and the other two needing only panels (the expensive part). Had the timing been different, we might have had a spare we could have offered to be flown, but Fox is not that far along yet. BUT! This is the beauty of the cubesat standard. Even if the vehicle changes, the requirements remain the same (or close enough), and late substitutions can be made, possibly. My point is, support Fox-1 and -2 (and FunCube) -now-, so that when the next empty slot turns up, we might be at the point we can respond with a flight ready spacecraft. My version of reality....yours may differ :-) 73, Drew KO4MA _______________________________________________ Sent via [email protected]. Opinions expressed are those of the author. Not an AMSAT-NA member? Join now to support the amateur satellite program! Subscription settings: http://amsat.org/mailman/listinfo/amsat-bb
