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Posted by: tedstryk Jan 22 2005, 02:15 PM

In Astronomy's February issue, they report that Russia has approved funding for the Phobos-Grunt mission. Design work has gone on since 1997, and the new design is scaled down to fly an a Soyuz rocket instead of the larger Proton. The main purpose is similar to Phobos-2, with the addition of a sample return. Also being discussed is the possibility of it carrying a few "meteorological stations" fof Mars itself. Generally, I have written this mission off as "never going to happen," but with the new Russian alliance with ESA, I wonder if they might be able to actually fly this thing. Also, with Putin's increasingly Soviet-style leadership, and with the likelyhood of lunar missions from China and India, Russian pride might drive this mission. If so, I have a concern. This mission sounds really, really ambitious. And the Russians have never even sent a fully successful Mars orbiter, and that is when they launched them in pairs or triplets. Still, if the mission flies, even if it doesn't bring back Phobos soil it might obtain some interesting results. Here is ESA's Phobos-Grunt page:
http://www.esa.int/SPECIALS/ESA_Permanent_Mission_in_Russia/SEMIJFW4QWD_0.html

Also, ESA has another page on potential Russian programs, although this seem to be nothing but pipe dreams at the moment. Would be a cool mission though.

http://www.esa.int/SPECIALS/ESA_Permanent_Mission_in_Russia/SEM0LFW4QWD_0.html

And also a page on the only partially realized current Russian project, its program to put instruments on other's spacecraft, such as HEND on Odyssey.

http://www.esa.int/SPECIALS/ESA_Permanent_Mission_in_Russia/SEMHMFW4QWD_0.html

Posted by: SFJCody Jan 22 2005, 02:58 PM

There's a pdf document on these speculative missions here:


http://sci2.esa.int/nextstep/RussianProgram.pdf

Posted by: SFJCody Feb 2 2005, 10:42 AM

http://www.online-translator.com/url/tran_url.asp?lang=en&direction=re&template=General&cp1=CP1251&cp2=NO&autotranslate=on&transliterate=on&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.laspace.ru%2Frus%2Fphobos.php

http://www.online-translator.com/url/tran_url.asp?lang=en&direction=re&template=General&cp1=CP1251&cp2=NO&autotranslate=on&transliterate=on&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.laspace.ru%2Frus%2Fphobos_sheme.php

http://www.online-translator.com/url/tran_url.asp?lang=en&direction=re&template=General&cp1=CP1251&cp2=NO&autotranslate=on&transliterate=on&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.laspace.ru%2Frus%2Fphobos_ship.php

http://issfd.kiam1.rssi.ru/abstracts/p16_2.pdf


http://www.online-translator.com/url/tran_url.asp?lang=en&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.kiam1.rssi.ru%2FPHOBOS%2F&direction=re&template=General&cp1=NO&cp2=NO&autotranslate=on&transliterate=on&psubmit2.x=49&psubmit2.y=6

Posted by: tedstryk Feb 2 2005, 01:07 PM

That is some pretty interesting stuff. Back in the 80's, when our planetary program (other than already flying projects like Viking, Voyager, PVO, and ICE) wasn't flying any new spacecraft, the Soviets were the only major game in town. They spent the early part of the decade studying Venus (including the landers and the balloons), contributed a major component of the Halley flotilla, and then went to Mars with the Phobos mission. The Phobos spacecraft were the first of a new plan for exploration that included missions very similar to the Fortuna mission in that literature. They included balloons, rovers, and orbiters for Mars, and, yes, Phobos-Grunt (a much more sophisticated version). There was also an advanced Venera program. There was a great article sometime in 1988 in Astronomy about it. Then, of course, after the first of these new missions launched (Phobos '88), the whole Soviet system crumbled. Mars '96 (Which would have been Mars '90 - the original Mars'96 plan was a veritable Battlestar Galactica with rovers, balloons, and landers) managed to peter along and make it to the launchpad but was unlucky enough to have a bad upper stage on its launch vehicle. Phobos-Grunt, scaled down to fly on a Soyuz instead of a larger Proton rocket, was the only mission for which real design work continued. They have periodically presented other missions, both on their websites and at conferences, such as Venera-D and various asteroid missions, but I think they are generally sales-pitches in hopes of international funding which would be needed to fly them. Phobos-Grunt is the only mission that the Russian parliament and Putin have actually agreed to fund. That is why I take it more seriously. Putin feels threatened by Bush's Moon-Mars plan, and a Phobos sample return mission in 2009 would be a great way to upstage MSL. Of course, one has to hope that Russian space technology has improved...This mission will have to be longer lived than previous Russian spacecraft. But it has great potential.

Posted by: AlexBlackwell Dec 14 2005, 07:07 PM

An interesting tidbit from Tony Reichhardt's News article in the http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v438/n7070/index.html:

"Russia's long-suffering space scientists had reason to celebrate last week as a generous funding increase was approved for the national space agency, giving hope to missions that have long been on hold.

[...]

"One such mission, called Phobos-Grunt, now seems to be on track to launch in 2009. It will head for the martian moon Phobos, where it will land and collect a soil sample before returning to Earth. The mission has been scaled down — it will use conventional propulsion and launch on a Soyuz rocket, instead of the more expensive Proton — but it should still manage to land 45 kilograms of scientific instrumentation on Phobos.

"Spacecraft engineers at the Moscow-based Lavochkin Association are laying plans for an ambitious mission called Luna-Glob, which would deliver an orbiter and a network of instruments to the Moon for geophysical studies. This mission would probably get funding only after Phobos-Grunt is well under way, says [Mikhail] Marov [of the Keldysh Institute of Applied Mathematics in Moscow]."

References:

Budget boost gets Russia back in the space game
Tony Reichhardt
Nature 438, 896 (2005)
doi:10.1038/438896b
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v438/n7070/full/438896b.html

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

At the risk of sounding curmudgeonly, I'll only say that I'll believe in this mission when I see it. I was at an International Astronautical Congress in Toulouse, France, a few years back when a presentation for this mission was given by individuals from the Moscow Aviation Insititute and the Lavochkin Association. None of the others present who heard the presentation believed it would ever happen, at least not without involvement from the U.S. or Europe. In fact, a few "western space professionals" laughed outright, and one said "they're [the Russians] just looking for outside support."

Having said that, I hope it does come off, given that the http://www.lpi.usra.edu/meetings/LPSC99/pdf/1155.pdf concept never made the downselect in a couple of Discovery solicitations, and especially if http://www.lpi.usra.edu/meetings/metsoc2005/pdf/5274.pdf never gets selected as a future Discovery mission. Indeed, I think both Phobos and Deimos get short changed in the U.S. and European Mars exploration architectures.

Posted by: ljk4-1 Dec 14 2005, 07:31 PM

Ah, Gulliver! The name of a relatively simple lander planned for Mars back in the 1960s that would have shot out sticky strings to pull in some surface samples for analysis.

http://www.spacedaily.com/news/mars-life-03l.html

Question: Going on what we know about the Martian surface now and remembering the data from Viking, had Gulliver happened, would the scientists have concluded at the time that they did indeed find life on Mars?

Posted by: ElkGroveDan Dec 14 2005, 07:37 PM

Let's hope they keep away from the Lipovitan-D.

Posted by: AlexBlackwell Dec 14 2005, 08:19 PM

Or its variant - "http://www.answers.com/main/ntquery;jsessionid=14v806rt29mle?method=4&dsid=2055&dekey=lilliput&gwp=8&curtab=2055_1&sbid=lc03b-D"

Posted by: Decepticon Dec 14 2005, 10:27 PM

I say they rename the probe Mars-Lipovitan-D04A

Posted by: Bob Shaw Dec 14 2005, 11:32 PM

From what I can tell, Gulliver was slated to be one of the Advanced Mariner experiments - certainly, the illustration in Gatland's 'Unmanned Spaceflight' appears to be of the Philco Lander. And I doubt it'd have coped well in the search for life!

Bobn Shaw

Posted by: BruceMoomaw Dec 15 2005, 01:14 AM

The life detector on Gulliver was none other than Gilbert Levin's instrument -- so, had they flown that alone, there would certainly have been a tidal wave of "Life Found on Mars!" headlines that might have proven just a teensy bit premature.

Posted by: Toma B Dec 15 2005, 07:21 AM

So it will be a scaled down version of "Phobos"...


I can still remember high expectations of that spacecraft...Mars orbiter, Phobos landing etc...
In the end; Phobos-1 was lost before it even reached Mars and Phobos-2 took "staggering amount of information including 38 images"...same basic design was again used on Mars-96 but it never had a chance to see Mars....
Russia (CCCP) has yet to score first successful mission to Mars...
As said above I'll believe it when I see it...
Wish them good luck anyway.

Posted by: Richard Trigaux Dec 15 2005, 09:45 AM

I think that if the Russians are coming to an end of their economic difficulties and come back on stage for space exploration, everybody should be happy.

Posted by: tedstryk Dec 15 2005, 01:49 PM

I hope so. In the past, budgeted money has not been delivered...I hope hthey go through with this. It is a shame Phobos 2 did not return more images. One thing forgotten is that its main transmitter failed before arrival, so kind of like Galileo (though not as severe, Phobos-2 couldn't use compression like Galileo), Phobos 2 had great difficulty returning large data products.

Posted by: ljk4-1 Dec 15 2005, 02:25 PM

While the Soviets never had a fully successful mission to Mars, they did have partial successes, and they did land the first spacecraft on the planet, even if they did all go bye-bye prematurely. Of course none of them returned nearly as much data and images as the US missions.

Posted by: TheChemist Dec 15 2005, 02:28 PM

Maybe when they 're done with their investments in the English premiership and F1, some money will be left for space exploration

Posted by: AlexBlackwell Dec 15 2005, 05:03 PM

To put it mildly, I think that's an understatement. I certainly do not want to engage in bashing the Russians -- they have some fairly top notch scientists -- but their data return via spacecraft from Mars has been much worse than "[not] nearly as much...as the US missions." I would venture a guess, without having done a bit by bit comparison, that Mars Express alone has returned more data than all Soviet/Russian Mars missions combined.

Posted by: AlexBlackwell Dec 15 2005, 05:57 PM

I agree, and if/when I see hard evidence supporting this scenario, I promise to be happy. A notice in the press that some mission "seems to be on track to launch" four years from now doesn't get me too excited.

Posted by: ljk4-1 Dec 15 2005, 08:14 PM

I may be wrong on this, but I remember reading that Soviet space philosophy when it came to robot deep space probes was to build them as best they could, but essentially "test" them in space. If they failed on the way, one simply pretended to the West that they never existed, learn from the mistakes if possible, and try to build a better one next time. The US view was build and test them to the max before sending them out.

This is one reason why the USSR had more launches and more failures than the US.

Posted by: tedstryk Dec 15 2005, 08:18 PM

That and the fact that the cover up was considered possible (even if in the end it wasn't. For example, the Mars 4-7 mission had serious computer problems, and the scientists wanted to delay, but the powers that be ordered that it go ahead, with the idea that if one of the landers managed to erp back a bit of data before its problems killled it, it would be the last chance to beat Viking. Mars-6 did return descent data, but it was very limited, and most know for an false reading from the pump for the mass spectrometer that made them think there was Argon in the atmosphere.

Posted by: RNeuhaus Dec 15 2005, 08:33 PM

I think that previously Russian has failed many missions due mainly to political factors rather than technical reasons. The Soviet's leaders had made a lot of pressure and unrealistic judgment on engineers and scientists to do anything almost impossible, hurry up all things because there were a space race against the U.S. of America. to anywhere: Moon, Venus and Mars.

Then, now the view on the space is somewhat more calm than before so anybody are not in hurry to send any spacecraft to the space as a race but rather as on self pace rate in which it will guarantee a much higher mission success rate.

Hope that Russian, in that time, will manage better the space exploration programs without any kind race with any nation of Earth...rather better with more international cooperation

Rodolfo

Posted by: JonClarke Dec 16 2005, 12:30 AM

Don't know about the space environment test program but Moon, Mars and Venus landers were extensively tested on earth in extensive ground, drop and simulation chamber tests. It seems to have paid off with the venus landers but to with mars. Don't know why.

And yes Alex, you are a curmudgeon. I think they will pull it off. They are getting serious budget increases at last. And I don't think comparing Phobos 2 to ME is fair given that the design of ME 15 years more advanced - better compared with mariner 9 which returned lower quality and less diverse data but at lot more of it. If you are not excited by an annoucement that this mission is on track for 4 years i assume you are equaly unexcited by ML, which is also supposed to be on track for a launch 4 years from now.

Toma B: - you will find that Phobos 2 collected a lot more data than 38 pictures. There are at least 300 publications I can identify on this mission. As a sample return mission, there is no way that it can be considered a scaled down Phobos 2, given that that was did not involve sample return.

Ted: while the amount was erroneous, the interpretation of the Mars 6 lander MS data did rightly alert people to the possibility that Mars has above terrestrial proportions of Ar.

That said, the mission does scare me at bit. Hayabusa has shown how difficult small body sample return can be. I would like to see the Russians get a few more runs on the Mars board with some simple missions before trying something this ambitious. A criticism of their prevous Mars missions would be that (unlike with their lunar and venus probes) they did not iron out bugs with repeat missions but sent a succession of every more complex probes.


Jon

Posted by: AlexBlackwell Dec 16 2005, 01:52 AM

I sure hope you're right, Jon. Me, I've seen too many Russian "sales pitches" to be excited at this early juncture. Indeed, I've seen too many NASA "virtual slide show" missions that never left the PowerPoint file, too, and NASA has a much better track record over the past 10-15 years than the Russians!


Now who's making the unfair comparisons, Jon?

At least MSL (I presume that's the mission you're referring to by "ML") has solicited and selected instruments. I'll concede, however, that that's no guarantee MSL will fly.

Posted by: edstrick Dec 16 2005, 06:13 AM

The soviets and the Russians after them have had a severe problem with reliabilty in initial flights of series of spacecraft on lunar and planetary missions. After a series of sucesses and partial sucesses with the series-1 lunar missions (Luna 1 through 3, not including launch failures), they had sustained failures with the series-2 lunar series, Luna 4 through 8; before Luna 9 landed, 10-12 orbited and 13 landed.

The series 3 lunar missions started with the failure of a sample return mission (Luna 15, during Apollo 11), then succeeded with Luna 16, 2 Lunokhod rovers, 2 heavy lunar orbiters (who's science return seemed to be minimal) and 2 more successful sample returns (and 2 sample return missions that were reputedly damaged during landing attempts in the rough highlands south of Mare Crisium. On the whole, pretty successful.

Similarly, the one block-1 planetary launch and all the early series-2 planetary launches failed until Venera 4 in 1967, 5 & 6 in 69 probed the atmosphere, and finally Venera 7 landed and had a partially successful mission in 1971 (Venera 8 one opposition later was a complete success) All the series-2 Mars missions failed, though one that was launched as an engineering test after it missed the launch window to mars, Zond-3, did a successful lunar flyby. All the series-3 lander missions to Mars were failures, though the Mars 3 orbiter was a success, and the Mars 5 orbiter was a success that failed prematurely.

After failing to send missions to compete with Vikings at Mars in 75, the series-3 missions to Venus succeeded brilliantly. Venera 11 and 12 failed to turn on landed science after highly successful atmosphere descents, but 13 and 14 were full successes, 15 and 16 were successful radar orbiters (one had some problems), and Vega 1 and 2 venus landers and balloons were successful, and the Halley flyby missions were largely successful, though the imaging quality at the comet was fairly miserable (it did provide essential pathfinding targeting for Giotto).

The series-4 missions (2 Phobos missions and poor Mars 96, which was launched-to-death) failed, but the Phobos 2 mission was a substantial scientific success as a Mars orbiter before it failed during the Phobos orbit rendezvous operations. Then their budget failed.

Posted by: Toma B Dec 16 2005, 07:14 AM

I have said "In the end; Phobos-1 was lost before it even reached Mars and Phobos-2 took "staggering amount of information including 38 images"...same basic design was again used on Mars-96 but it never had a chance to see Mars...."
But it wasn't data it should have colected...it was Phobos explorer and it died before almost any Phobos science was done...right?
Anyway I wish them luck with new spacecraft, first one in 10 (or so ) years...

Posted by: Richard Trigaux Dec 16 2005, 07:50 AM

I Agree with all this.

Posted by: edstrick Dec 16 2005, 08:17 AM

Toma B: "....But it wasn't data it should have colected...it was Phobos explorer and it died before almost any Phobos science was done...right?...."

Wrong. The Phobos mission hopper and landers were entirely phobos dedicated, but the main mission was targeted toward both Mars and Phobos. The early part of the In-orbit phase of the mission was in an eccentric orbit doing Mars science that could not be done later (especially fields and particles science) that could not be done as well from the more circular pre-rendezvour or the nearly circular rendezvous orbit. The thermal infrared Thermoscan and Near infrared mapping spectrometer data in particular was to continue after operations at Phobos had terminated.

Posted by: RNeuhaus Dec 16 2005, 04:47 PM

It is evident that the Soviet space's technology seems to be better suited for hot environment such as for Venus than for the cold environment ones of Mars. I seems funny that Soviet's technology is better suited for hot environment and its technology was so heavy that landing to Mars makes a lot more trouble than to Venus.

I seems that the more Soviet has tried, the Venus case with 18 missions (approximately) versus 8 missions to Mars (approximately). Long learning curve due to the Soviet leaders' pressure to accelerate the mission.

To land on Venus is easier than to Mars? Then to land on Phobos must be much easier than to Mars. As I was the witness of Hayabusa, the landing on Phobos needs a spaceship that travels very slow toward Phobos, slower than to Mars. The other obstacle, the Phobos shape is not symetrical and I am not sure if it rotates (slow or fast) or not. If it rotates, it would be even more difficult to land.

Rodolfo

Posted by: tedstryk Dec 16 2005, 07:30 PM

"To land on Venus is easier than to Mars? Then to land on Phobos must be much easier than to Mars. "

Phobos is a whole other game...Venus is easier to land on than Mars in that you can exclusively use the atmosphere to break to a speed in which it is safe to land. That statement does not indicate that Venus is an easier place for a craft to operate - it is just the plunking it down that is simplified.

Posted by: edstrick Dec 17 2005, 05:58 AM

Landing on Venus is "easy"... The US did it on the Zeroth try. Pioneer Venus multiprobe missions ended at impact. The large probe and one small probe went silent at impact, one small probe lasted about a second, and the third lasted some ?67? minutes before it FRIED. The small probes didn't drop their heat shields so their bottoms were kinda "armored".

The reason Mars is HARD to land on is the atmosphere. On the Moon, or Mercury (ignoring the large Delta-V velocity change to get there) all you need is throttlable rocket engines, doppler sensing radars to measure vertical and horizontal velocity and altitude, a not very smart computer, and landing legs. Terminal guidance helps in rough terrain.

On Venus, all you need is an atmosphere entry heat shield, and a parachute. If you want to still be transmitting when you land, a pressure-vessle and lots of insulation are recommended.

On Mars, you need everything you need at Venus to do atmosphere entry, and a double parachute system, supersonic drogue chute followed by a LARGE, probably supersonic main chute. That keeps you from making a small crater lined with shiny metal bits before you're well below the speed of sound.

But then, you have to switch over to an entirely separate, second landing system. Either you need a hard landing system like Pathfinder/MER, comparable to the Luna 9 and 13 systems on the Moon, or a Viking/MPL/Phoenix rocket-propulsion landing system comparable to Surveyor/Apollo/Luna-16-sample-return/Luna-17-Lunokhod. You can get by with dinky rockets or dinky fuel tanks at least, cause you are going hundreds of miles/hr when you light the engines, instead of thousands, but it's just as complicated as if there was no atmosphere.

To land on Mars is essentially twice as complicated as landing on Moon or Venus. It could be worse. Try landing on the top of Olympus Mons. You don't have time to deploy a chute. You'd have to do an atmosphere entry, slow down to something like Mach 2, and blow out plugs in the heat shield as you light engines, maybe while blowing off the backshield. Build the lander directly into the heatshield. Instead of 6 minutes of terror, you'd basically have 4. Yow!

Posted by: BruceMoomaw Dec 19 2005, 02:30 AM

Exactly the same problem applies for a human-sized lander (30-100 metric tons) ANYWHERE on Mars -- because a lander 64 times more massive than another of generally similar design will have only 16 times as much forward aeroshell area to brake it during entry.

This was the subject of Rob Manning's COMPLEX talk, which didn't make it into my final "Astronomy" article. No practical parachute design can be big enough to solve the problem; nor can high lift/drag aeroshells (like the "Ellipsled" proposed to aerocapture Neptune Orbiter, or even a winged vehicle) solve it.

The only possible solutions are (1) rocket engines capable of firing out the lander's bottom at supersonic speeds BEFORE it deploys its chute (as Ed suggests), or (2) a huge, 20-30 meter diameter decelerator capable of working at hypersonic speeds -- either rigid (in which case it must survive the heat of entry), or inflatable and deployed after the heating is over. Any of these three possible solutions, as you can imagine, will require a hell of a lot of new engineering work. Indeed, Manning says grimly: "These technologies are at very low TRL and have very uncertain outcomes on their success...We do not have high-likelihood Mars EDL systems to choose from." An advance test flight of any such general design will be necessary, with a lander weighing 10% as much as the actual manned lander. Yet another serious problem for those more eager than I am to see Footprints On Mars. Even the sample-return lander (about 1200 kg) will require a radically new parachute design.

Posted by: ljk4-1 Dec 19 2005, 02:38 AM

Another problem to consider when landing on Mars with retrorockets: The fine powdery surface grains would spread far and wide and sandblast anything nearby. Better have landing pads far from the base, unless they come in on an airplane.

http://www.news.cornell.edu/Chronicle/05/1.20.05/Louge_research.html

How much surface dirt did the Vikings kick out when they landed? Considering how much they wanted to find microbes at the landing site, and they could not move around, I am surprised in some ways that they did not think of another landing method to disturb the ground as little as possible.

Posted by: JonClarke Dec 19 2005, 03:03 AM

Not Much Viking had three landing engines with 18 nozzles fueled by specially purified hydrazine monopropellant. The hydrazine would not contaminate the ground and the 18 nozzles were specifically designed to minimise erosion on the ground. Some effects were noted though not particularly severe.

Jon

Posted by: JonClarke Dec 19 2005, 03:07 AM

Do you haver a link to his COMPLEX work - abstracts, reports, etc?

Jon

Posted by: BruceMoomaw Dec 19 2005, 03:33 AM

Unfortunately, no -- at least for this document. I can keep looking for other documents with different names on ths subject, though -- or, failing that, at least type in the print in his PowerPoint presentation as an attachment here later on.

As for the Vikings: they shut off their engines at 3 meters altitude (versus 4 for the lunar Surveyors) -- and, as you say, they deliberately used a design of clustered small nozzles to minimize ground disturbance.

Posted by: edstrick Dec 19 2005, 07:12 AM

Note regarding the Viking clustered engines: During testing of candidate engines -- maybe they already knew - that above a very few millibar pressures, a conventional bell-shaped engine nozzle's plume collapsed from a nearly hemisphereical plume to a focussed jet, as the plume detached from the nozzle. Simulated Viking landings in vaccuum chambers dug serious pits in the dirt and scattered it all over everywhere and everything. The Surveyor and Apollo LM engines would have done the same if Moon had a Mars like atmosphere.

Of course, the idiots we know who claim we never went to the moon don't know this. It's one of their stupid fallacies, that the rocket engines should have dug deep craters under the LM.

Posted by: JonClarke Dec 19 2005, 09:09 AM

I was under the impression that Viking shut down just above the surface. "On Mars" however says that it occurred when the pads touched the ground.

Jon

Posted by: BruceMoomaw Dec 19 2005, 10:16 AM

I may have to scrounge for confirmation, but I'm absolutely sure from what I read at the time that the engines shut off at 10 feet up. They were, after all, extremely concerned on that mission about the possibility of contaminating their surface samples with terrestrial organics.

Posted by: RNeuhaus Dec 19 2005, 03:52 PM

I don't think that the next manned mission to Mars would be a spaceship bigger than the Moon Landing because of the already discussed reasons (low Martian density, not-uninform density atmosphere, high delta velocity (5-6 k/s).

The most practical design would be multiples spaceship, one for manned, the other for cargo (oxigen, food and water) and the other for return. This is only valid for the present time technology and let us see how the technology will improve within 20 years.

About landing Phobos, it has other kind of challenges. Since it is orbiting from west to east 3 times a day (every 8:08 hour approx.) at 9,350 km from Mars and its is synchronous orbit radius to Mars. The spaceship would have to make many aerobraking orbits around Mars and have a much bigger fuel tanks in order to reduce its velocity before landing on the regolith covered by half meter of dust surface. Perhaps, it might have some ice as a water supplies to spaceship. Luckly it has no axis-rotation so the logistics for landing would not so complicated as to land to Eros or Itokawa.

Rodolfo

Posted by: AlexBlackwell Feb 22 2006, 04:21 PM

Note that Zakharov et al. have an http://www.cosis.net/abstracts/EGU06/02378/EGU06-J-02378.pdf to be presented at the upcoming http://www.cosis.net/members/frame.php?url=meetings.copernicus.org/egu2006/.

Posted by: Bricktop Mar 10 2006, 09:03 PM

Video of Phobos-Grunt

mms://restart.roscosmos.ru/Media/FOBOS2.wmv

Posted by: GravityWaves Mar 25 2006, 05:32 PM

Soyuz is soon launching from Europe's Kourou

Their arianespace PDF files are online,
but it seems to a big download hundreds and hundreds of pages

Posted by: AlexBlackwell Mar 26 2006, 05:43 PM

Does anyone have any objections to merging this thread with the "http://www.unmannedspaceflight.com/index.php?showtopic=1844" thread?

Posted by: AlexBlackwell Mar 26 2006, 08:16 PM

I hope no one objects. I went ahead and merged the two topics.

Posted by: Decepticon Mar 30 2006, 01:26 PM

I can't believe how many burns this probe needs to make!

I don't know about this one folks.

I have to admit Russian probes look cool.

Posted by: PhilHorzempa Apr 11 2006, 09:57 PM

[size=2]


Recent news seems to indicate that Russia will be increasing its spending
on space in the next few years. Does anyone in the UMSF community know
if the Phobos-Grunt probe is set for a definite launch in 2009? I would think
that with the successful sample return of Stardust, that the Russians may be
more inclined to actually fly this mission. Does anyone know if a delay to
a launch in 2011 is being discussed? Also, is this probe definitely set to be
launched on the Soyuz-Fregat, or is the Proton still a contender?

Posted by: PhilHorzempa May 6 2006, 02:55 AM

The Russians have recently issued a video summary of the Phobos-Grunt
mission.

You can find it at this site.

http://restart.roscosms.ru/Media/FOBOS2.wmv


It sounds as if the proper way to pronounce the name of this spacecraft
is Phobos-Groond. Also, if anyone is fluent in Russian, a translation would
be welcome.

The Phobos-Grunt mission appears to be ambitious and exciting. Note that
the return capsule foregoes a parachute, and uses "lithobraking" upon
landing on the Earth!
Also, the return sample core appears to build on the technology of the
latter Luna sample return missions, with the core being coiled-up inside of
the return capsule.

One interesting observation concerns the animation of Phobos itself.
Those of us who know the features of our Moon well, will recognize the map
of our Moon's Far Side wrapped around an irregularly-shaped object.


Another Phil

Posted by: ljk4-1 Jun 16 2006, 04:06 PM

This very recent article (in Russian) contains a diagram of the Phobos-Grunt mission:

http://www.federalspace.ru/NewsDoSele.asp?NEWSID=1581

Posted by: DonPMitchell Jun 16 2006, 07:09 PM

Here are NPO Lavochkin's pages about it: http://www.laspace.ru/rus/phobos.php

Posted by: RNeuhaus Jun 16 2006, 07:38 PM

The Phobos-Grunt spacecraft has a typical Russian design: rustic and simple in order to save useful weigh. That spaceship has a much greater volume proportion for fuel to the rest than any sonda that I have ever seen. The reason is to bring fuel for two ways!

Rodolfo

Posted by: AlexBlackwell Jun 17 2006, 12:25 AM

Well, since it's been quite some time since the Russians have had a successful interplanetary mission, we'll see if they can simply pick up where they left off, with a Phobos sample return no less.

Craig Covault has an interesting piece in this week's issue of AW&ST ("Russians Criticize U.S. on Lunar and Planetary Cooperation") where he states:

"Russia is reenergizing its lunar and planetary program with the planned launch of a sample return mission to the Martian moon Phobos and the launch of an ambitious lunar penetrator mission, the first Russian mission to the Moon in 30 years (AW&ST June 5, p. 20). But Russian managers here said the U.S. has shown little or no interest in Russian overtures for collaboration on these flights."

Translation: The Russians are under no illusions that they don't need partners to make these missions work, which is why, in the absence of any firm collaboration agreements, I remain skeptical that, for example, Phobos-Grunt will ever happen, nice graphics and lofty rhetoric notwithstanding.

Posted by: RNeuhaus Jun 17 2006, 01:40 AM

Why aren't the Americans much interested to work with Russian's overtures? Let suppose that this cooperation will have many advantages for them and also to our mankind:

1. Saves money.
2. Interchange of knowledge, technology and experience..
3. Shorten the development and launch cycle time.

I must admit that the above reason is just an ideal world. At this time and many centuries, we are still going to live with a country's domain barrier in our minds.

Watch it out that Russian will probably join with others countries willing to work with him. Are ESA interested to work with Russian in returning its project of Phobos-Grunt?
I have the impression that ESA is at the present time not much interested to join with Russians to work on that project unless ESA is more interested on explorating on any Gallilean Moon: Europa.

Rodolfo

Posted by: DonPMitchell Jun 17 2006, 03:46 AM

But unfortunately, I don't think any of these benefits would be seen. Russia would not supply a lot of money, they have almost no technology that NASA needs, and international planning could actually complicate development. ESA has needed Russia (or America) to perform interplanetary launches, but I think they also prefer to do things themselves if they can.

The fact that Russia launched Mars Express and Venus Express does indicate they can perform sophisticated tasks. And their Earth-resource and military satellites perform many of the same kinds of manuevers and sensor readings of a planetary probe.

I wish them luck. To be honest, I think international competition is a good thing, it will excite passion and public support for space exploration.

Posted by: AlexBlackwell Jun 19 2006, 05:48 PM

Unlike the case with interplanetary missions, Russia hasn't experienced a 20-year gap in launches, and no one really questions their launch capability. And I'm not sure that operating civilian earth-monitoring or military satellites is really that great an indicator as to whether they can pull off a Phobos sample return.

Posted by: Jim from NSF.com Jun 19 2006, 07:33 PM

The Russian design bureau's have habit of proposing missions and giving summaries to the media, when the RSA doesn't have the money to do anything. The Kliper is another example.

Posted by: DonPMitchell Jun 19 2006, 08:23 PM

I'm sure NASA could do it. I'd give Russia or ESA about equal likelihood of being able to pull it off. Military and Earth-resource satellites require technology for precise attitude control and orbital maneuvering, which I think would be relevant to a mission like this.

Posted by: AlexBlackwell Jun 19 2006, 08:32 PM

I'm sure it would be relevant, if not critical. I guess I'm looking at Phobos-Grunt in totality, not each individual component, which the Russians may or may not have sucessfully demonstrated in analogous situations. In the early stages, there were many who thought Mars Observer was simply going to be a matter of flying a terrestrial weather satellite to Mars. Or that MPL wasn't really that hard because we had already soft-landed on Mars twenty years before.

Posted by: tedstryk Jun 19 2006, 08:47 PM

I think there is another thing to look at, in terms of ability to pull this mission off. Alex and Don have made posts concerning the technical aspects. But I think a lot of the debate is whether or not, come 2009, there will actually be a launch, or whether the mission dies on paper. I think there is a reasonable chance of this mission actually launching.

Posted by: AlexBlackwell Jun 19 2006, 08:57 PM

I'm not stating absolutely that this mission will never fly. I hope it does. And anything (e.g., the Russians putting together Phobos-Grunt in 36 months) is possible, I guess. However, I need to see a lot more than what has been shown so far before I become a believer. As I mentioned earlier in this thread, I've seen the Russians basically chumming the waters for partners with mission concepts and no one has bitten. I don't even think the Russians believe they can pull off the mission alone. If they did, why would they be concerned that, as Covault reports, the U.S. isn't showing enough interest? My fear is that U.S. dollars will be tied up in this effort. I say let the Russians first show they can do it, and if they're successful, then I have no doubt that potential partners will be lining up.

Posted by: DonPMitchell Jun 19 2006, 09:06 PM

It's certainly something they've wanted to do for a long time.

[attachment=6323:attachment]

Here is a mystery photo for you all. There is something very interesting in this picture. Do you see it?

Posted by: AlexBlackwell Jun 19 2006, 09:14 PM

What, the Lavochkin and/or Babakin version of a "clean room"?

Posted by: Bob Shaw Jun 19 2006, 11:31 PM

Don:

Er...

Bob Shaw

Posted by: tedstryk Jun 19 2006, 11:47 PM

Don't see a picture...

Posted by: AlexBlackwell Jun 19 2006, 11:48 PM

Yeah, it's gone. Strange. I saw it earlier when I replied to the post.

Posted by: RNeuhaus Jun 20 2006, 03:25 AM

It is very well known of Russian's past missions to Mars which ended with 100% of failures for landers and some success for orbiters. It is of the year 80's, more than 25 years ago, at that time, there were NO cooperation between RSA and NASA (none ephemerals data) and the technology were very much backward.

Then now, these days, there is cooperation between them about the ephemerals data? The space technology of RSA is not so much backward as before. In spite of the fact of changing time, I think that the RSA mission to Phobos-Grunt is still of moderate risk since RSA has never tried a similar mission. I won't compare it as Earth - Moon versus Earth- Mars - Phobos which is somewhat more complicated since that mission there is one hoop additional (inter-planetary). That is the first kind of mission, return from another planet! that would be a deed that Russian likes according to long space history!

Rodolfo

Posted by: ljk4-1 Jun 20 2006, 12:36 PM

All of Don Mitchell's images in the Spacecraft Images thread are gone as well.

What happened?

Posted by: djellison Jun 20 2006, 12:52 PM

Not sure what's going on. The images all remain safe within the uploads folder, so they are certainly not 'gone'.

I'm going to check up with variaous support forums etc, see if anyone knows of a symptom like this. Very strange indeed.

Doug

Posted by: tedstryk Jun 20 2006, 01:42 PM

Actually, I believe their was cooperation on Phobos-2. In fact, Americans were involved in tracking the spacecraft to determine the decay rate of the orbit of Phobos (the moon, not Phobos-2). There was also limited exchange of data on the earlier missions.

Posted by: ljk4-1 Jun 20 2006, 01:45 PM

Is the 1 MB limit for attachments causing this? I was wondering how Don
could post so many images - not that I'm complaining, mind you.

Posted by: Bob Shaw Jun 20 2006, 01:54 PM

Doug:

Maybe you can raise the limits re size/quantity of posts for A Selected Few? Don's posts would qualify for special treatment by any criteria, IMHO.

Darn. Just got my post allocation chopped to 10k, have I?

Bob Shaw

Posted by: djellison Jun 20 2006, 02:07 PM

http://www.unmannedspaceflight.com/index.php?showtopic=2878

(totally unrealted to attachment limits - and indeed, Don is the sort of guy whereby if he reached the limit - I'd increase it )

Doug

Posted by: AlexBlackwell Jul 17 2006, 07:36 PM

Craig Covault, reporting from the Farnborough 2006 Air Show, has an interesting article ("Mars Phobos Mission Readied As Russia Weighs Goals") in the July 17, 2006, issue of Aviation Week & Space Technology. Rather than quoting excerpts, which is tough to do while maintaining context, and which also misses some of the Lavochkin artwork, I'll go ahead and attach the article in this message.

Posted by: nprev Jul 20 2006, 12:01 AM

...ambitious, hope that it flies!!!

I wonder how long the surface sample acquisition & return launch process is anticipated to last. The three-year timeframe sure reminds me of the manned Mars landing proposals that only permitted a ten-day surface stay...not a lot of schedule slack there, especially if there are problems...

EDIT: Whoops...I may have confused that (presumably Hohmann) trajectory stay time with that of a much faster nuclear-powered trip that featured something like a six-month dash each way. Can someone please clarify?

Posted by: jamescanvin Jul 20 2006, 01:06 AM

It says 11 months transit each way.

It also says the lander is designed to last a year on the surface.

Posted by: AlexBlackwell Jul 20 2006, 01:49 AM

Note that Zakharov et al. have a http://www.cosis.net/abstracts/EPSC2006/00088/EPSC2006-A-00088.pdf for the upcoming http://meetings.copernicus.org/epsc2006/index.html.

Posted by: konangrit Sep 19 2006, 09:31 AM

http://en.rian.ru/world/20060911/53726392.html

Posted by: IM4 Sep 21 2006, 06:17 PM

In fact after global redesigning in 2003 some of Fobos-Grunt payload (50-100 kg) had been allocated for additional scientific instruments, presumably of foreign origin (european first of all). That’s the opportunity we offer to Chinese and some agreement had been finally reached. The kind of payload is still to be determined. It can be some instrument or even small exploration probe like japanese “Minerva”, which failed to land on Itokawa. The main question is whether Chinese manage to meet deadline of 2009 year launch.

By now launch date remains steady and funding increases progressively every year. First technological model of spacecraft was manufactured this summer and already shipped to vibrotesting. So we have all chances to make Fobos-Grunt a reality.

Of course this is a very ambitious mission, even more complex and difficult than Hayabusa. Fobos-Grunt will perform actual landing, not hovering in Haybusa’s style, that’s much more risky and greatly depend on too many circumstances which are still unknown. For example there is still exist no accurate map of Phobos. We need map with resolution of 30 cm to detect all potentially hazardous rubbles and slopes, but currently only 3-5 m resolution available. Nonetheless after preliminary investigations several landing sites were chosen. Primary site is located near 20 S, 315 W. This is equatorial region on Mars-facing side of Phobos , in its trailing hemisphere. See picture , I tried to attach. Smooth terrain without significant rubbles or grooves spans 310-360 W longitude and 40 S – 10 N latitude. Suitable place for landing and for observation - almost all the sky will be filled with Mars. After deorbit from near-Phobos trajectory landing ellipse has sizes of approximately 800x400 meters, but actually spacecraft can be autonomously guided to the chosen site within accuracy of ~10 m. Rather tricky, but paraphrasing famous sentence : “We choose to go to the Phobos till the end of decade, not ‘cause it easy, but ‘cause it hard.”

Posted by: Phil Stooke Sep 21 2006, 07:22 PM

Thank you for this interesting contribution.

Can you say if a scientific paper will be published or a conference presentation will be made concerning the site selection process?

I remember discussing this with some people from GEOKHI several years ago. At that time a site on the northeast rim of Stickney was thought to be a possible site.

Phil Stooke

Posted by: RNeuhaus Sep 21 2006, 07:23 PM

Welcome IM4. Your report was very interesting. Shall you let us know where do you get the above information? Is there a Phobos-Grunt project WEB portal?

Rodolfo

Posted by: MaxSt Sep 21 2006, 07:24 PM

That would make for some great panoramas from the ground, I imagine...

Posted by: IM4 Sep 22 2006, 08:50 AM

There are several possible sites, i suppose. Ultimate decision will be made only after detailed imaging. You are right about Stickney rim, such a place was also under consideration, for example see http://www.lpi.usra.edu/meetings/lpsc2000/pdf/1665.pdf by Kuzmin, Shingareva. However their later papers in the "Astronomicheskiy vestnik" ("Astronomical bulletin") were referred to another places. As far as I know Springer is currently republishing "Astronomicheskiy vestnik", but I don’t know exact English title for this journal.


I doubt if such portal really exists. Information about Fobos-Grunt is dispersed among numerous articles, interviews and press-releases. I’ve just summarized some materials into single message.

Posted by: RNeuhaus Sep 29 2006, 11:16 PM

A new update.

http://www.marsdaily.com/reports/Russia_Hopes_To_Launch_Craft_To_Mission_Mars_Moon_Phobos_In_2009_999.html

The interesting points are:

1) He said there will be no need to use heavy carrier rockets, which make such launches very expensive.

2) The launch window for the voyage to Phobos is October 2009, and the journey will take 10-11 months. The spacecraft will begin its return journey to earth in 2011, which will take another 10-11 months.

Rodolfo

Posted by: Phil Stooke Sep 29 2006, 11:45 PM

There is this Phobos website:

http://www.kiam1.rssi.ru/PHOBOS/

(in russian...) - at the Keldysh Institute of Applied Mathematics. Some links lead to English text.

Phil

Posted by: RNeuhaus Sep 30 2006, 12:13 AM

Phi, Many thanks for posting the URL.

Rodolfo

Posted by: konangrit Nov 14 2006, 08:24 AM

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/R/RUSSIA_CHINA_SPACE?SITE=ALOPE&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT

Posted by: infocat13 Nov 16 2006, 02:08 AM

Perhaps HIRISE could assist with site selection?

Posted by: tuvas Nov 16 2006, 03:48 AM

I doubt it, I would guess that HiRISE won't get that great of resolution of Phobos, but I'm too lazy to do the math myself... Just would like to know what the Russian's fascination with Phobos is...

Posted by: Stu Nov 16 2006, 06:27 AM

Hmmmm. Well, its often been compared in shape to "a big, blackened potato", and potatoes are a staple part of the Russian diet. Maybe a Russian Hoagland has convinced the powers that be over there that it could be brought back to Earth and used to feed everyone...

Posted by: djellison Nov 16 2006, 08:00 AM

Well - roughly speaking, am I right in thinking that if you take the range in km, take a zero off, you can call it about that many cm/pixel ( i.e. 250-300k orbit = 25-20cm/pixel )

So - a good Phobos targetting opportunity would be about 10m/pixel, and Deimos about 25m/pixel

Doug

Posted by: Phil Stooke Nov 16 2006, 02:18 PM

tuvas: "Just would like to know what the Russian's fascination with Phobos is..."

It's a niche not yet exploited by others, and a valuable science target in its own right. First landing, first samples, chance of Mars material among the samples, solve controversy over its origin - lots of good reasons to go there.

Phil

Posted by: JTN Nov 25 2006, 02:02 AM

That link doesn't work for me any more. In case anyone else was still looking for that video, it's ended up on http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W0cUvK0Dgy8. (There was also a copy of the WMV http://hazardous-area.org/files/space/FOBOS2.wmv a few weeks ago, although I can't access it today.)


(Since no-one else has mentioned this yet:)
There have been some more news reports about this in the last few days. http://en.rian.ru/science/20061121/55853752.html suggests a "micro-satellite" from China will be dropped into Mars orbit (as has already been noted in this thread). Additionally, the http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2006/11/21/europe/EU_GEN_Russia_China_Space.php seems to think that China would "supply a device that would collect the soil samples" (seems rather late in the day to be deciding that?).

Dio's comments in http://www.unmannedspaceflight.com/index.php?showtopic=3427&st=15&p=75095&#entry75095 may also be of interest.

Posted by: IM4 Mar 16 2007, 06:43 PM

http://img65.imageshack.us/img65/8669/fobgbd1.jpg you can see large photo of the full-sized Phobos-Grunt mockup. Real spacecraft production starts this year, possibly in the nearest time. It won't be flight exemplar, but several identical spacecrafts for vibro-, thermo- and so on testing.

Posted by: konangrit May 24 2007, 03:37 PM

Some more details have been announced for the Chinese contribution named "Yinghuo-1":

http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2007-05/22/content_6132750.htm

Posted by: AlexBlackwell May 24 2007, 07:02 PM

Thanks for the update, konangrit. Phobos and Deimos have always fascinated me, so I sincerely hope this mission comes off.

However, as my comments throughout this thread indicate, I remain "cautiously skeptical."

Posted by: mchan May 25 2007, 02:43 AM

That's small for an interplanetary spacecraft. The description sounds like the Phobos-Grunt carrier can drop off the Chinese probe after the carrier achieves Mars orbit, so the China probe does not require an orbit insertion propulsion system which would save a lot of mass. It would be an impressive feat if it carries a good science payload and the power / comm to send data back.

Posted by: nprev May 25 2007, 04:59 PM

That IS tiny...makes me wonder if they intend to equip it only with a UHF omni antenna/transceiver & use Phobos-Grunt as a relay to/from Earth. If so, what a role-reversal...

Posted by: elakdawalla May 25 2007, 05:37 PM

http://www.planetary.org/blog/article/00000985/ on this in a presentation by Swedish scientist Stas Barabash. Yinghuo-1 will separate from Phobos-Grunt after MOI. It has no orbit transfer capabilities of its own, so will remain in a 800-by-80,000-kilometer equatorial orbit. It will have a 0.9- to 1.0-meter S-band HGA.

--Emily

Posted by: Adam May 25 2007, 07:05 PM

If I remember correctly there were plans for a swedish probe in the Phobos-grunt mission, just like the chinese one a few years ago. Seems like China was more interested.

Posted by: nprev May 25 2007, 07:17 PM

Thanks, Emily; terrific as usual (gee, you must be a journalist or something!) A damn good one, I might add.

Very ambitious yet compact; seems to reflect China's aggressive design philosophy to date (re the differences between Shenzhou V & VI); lots of confidence here. At this rate, they'll fly a Flagship-class mission independently by 2015!

Posted by: elakdawalla May 25 2007, 10:30 PM

If all that it takes to be a journalist is to know my way to google.com, then I'm a journalist.

--Emily

Posted by: Phil Stooke May 25 2007, 10:38 PM

That's all it takes to do anything nowadays.

Phil

Posted by: mchan May 27 2007, 06:52 PM

Good info, Emily. Thanks.

I am not sure of the characters for "Yinghuo", but Mars in Chinese is literally "Fire Star" which is pronounced "huoxing" in the common dialect.

Posted by: elakdawalla May 27 2007, 11:48 PM

This was the best thing I could find on what Yinghuo might mean, but I wasn't at all sure of the context on this site:
http://www.chinapage.com/astronomy/syho/syho.html

--Emily

Posted by: mchan May 28 2007, 07:06 AM

Interesting site. Yinghuo appears to be the name of the "Heaven" which "contains Mars" in an ancient Chinese astronomy text. It does not refer to the common name of the planet itself.

Posted by: Pedro_Sondas May 28 2007, 10:17 AM

http://www.shanghaidaily.com/sp/article/2007/200705/20070522/article_316758.htm

Posted by: Liss May 31 2007, 12:50 PM

The characters are 萤火一号.

Posted by: Paolo Jun 24 2007, 06:11 AM

This is a recent image of Fobos Grunt complete with the Chinese subsat scanned from a Lavochkin Association Le Bourget 2007 brochure.
I am a bit surprised by it. I wonder what happens to the sample return capsule if the subsat fails to release.
Paolo

Posted by: louisfriedman Jun 24 2007, 08:26 PM

Thanks for the nice image. We are working on a novel experiment to be carried along in the return capsule: http://planetary.org/programs/projects/life/
We don't know much about this Chinese orbiter or its interface; but we will try to find out more.

Louis Friedman

Posted by: nprev Jun 24 2007, 10:23 PM

Looks interesting, Mr. Friedman.

Any chance of an accompanying chip with TPS member names as well? Be neat to have one of those return on the first ever Earth-Mars (vicinity thereof, anyhow) round trip...nice thing to have in a display case in the Pasadena HQ lobby...

Posted by: PhilHorzempa Jul 18 2007, 06:04 PM

Just a note concerning the English spelling and pronounciation of this mission.
If you examine the Russian name for this mission, then you will note that
the Russian letter "y" should be pronounced "oo" as in the English word "moon."

Therefore, how about UMSF starting a trend and changing the title of this
thread to "Phobos-Groont?" This would more accurately reflect the Russian
pronounciation of the word (which means "soil" or "ground"). Also, and
to me the most important aspect, this would possibly avert jokes about
the "grunt" portion of the mis-translated name. "Groont" may sound a
little unusual, but it doesn't sound disgusting, as "grunt" does.


Another Phil

Posted by: tedstryk Jul 18 2007, 07:57 PM

In other words, it is a long U sound. The standard transliteration of Фобос-Грунт is Fobos-Grunt. We tend to manipulate to Phobos-Grunt to make Phobos recognizable (Russian has no parallel ph blend for an "f" sound), so if we were to make any change, it might be to be consistent, and, since we fully translate Phobos, we could call it Phobos-Soil. By this pattern, Vega would become Veha (it is an acronym of Venus-Halley, the mission's two targets, but because Russian has no equivalent of an H, their word for Halley is instead "Gallei." Venera would become Venus, Mars would be, well, Mars, Zond would become Probe, and Luna would become Moon (although since Luna refers to the moon in English as well, it could be left Luna without breaking this scheme). The reason that Russian names are often transliterated instead of translated is because the Russians have a naming scheme that can be very confusing (in other words, does one mean the probe or the planet). Although Mars isn't different, making it moot for it, for other names, we have avoided this confusion with things like calling the Venus series "Venera." Phobos-Soil would lead to the question of whether one was talking about the soil (technically regolith, but such a word would be problematic in popular publications since most of the public doesn't know thatword) on Phobos or the spacecraft. So, honoring the long standing tradition, we go with Phobos-Grunt, although we do restore the "ph" since it isn't phonetically different from "f." As far as switching to oo, I think it would be rather assinine for UMSF to defy the accepted principles of transliteration and what is used in all English publications regarding the mission for the improvement of the look and sound gained by changing "Phobos-Grunt" to "Phobos-Groont" (which doesn't look any better to me)).

Posted by: elakdawalla Jul 18 2007, 08:43 PM

I was going to write my own reply, but you did a better job than I would have, Ted.

I'll just add that it's fun to say "Phobos-Grunt" and "Luna-Glob," however you pronounce each one.

--Emily

Posted by: David Jul 18 2007, 08:43 PM

As "Grunt" is a borrowing from the German "Grund" (meaning ground or basis), an English transliteration "Phobos-Grund" would have been justifiable.

Luna has different connotations in Russian from English; in Russian being just the word for "Moon", while the English usage is by turns fanciful, pretentious, or science-fictional, usually referring to the Latin and not the Russian word (whose similar pronunciations are coincidental, the product of parallel linguistic evolution).

Posted by: tedstryk Jul 18 2007, 09:06 PM

That is true about Luna, although there are those who would like to make it a proper name for the moon (with Terra being the earth). That is why I said it would be possible, although I would add that you are right that "moon" would be more consistent if it were fully translated.

The problem with "Grund" is that the equivalent ground word in meaning in Russian is "Земля" ("Zemlya"). "Grunt" ("Грунт"), while indeed a derivative of "grund" (as is the English "ground," for that matter), has shifted in meaning in Russian to very specifically mean "soil." While there is a degree of interchangeability between the two (just as you could say that you buried the treasure in the soil or the ground), the mission is to fetch soil, and to use "grund" here would be the equivalent of going to the garden store and requesting a bag of potting ground or top ground instead of potting soil or topsoil. They might figure out what you mean, but it would certainly be awkward usage. So, while it is indeed a German root, the meaning has shifted enough that replacing the Russian word with its German root would be very problematic (not to mention that the Russians would likely find this insulting).

Posted by: Zvezdichko Jul 23 2007, 03:58 PM

Here, in Bulgaria, Grunt ( Грунт ) is used ONLY for soil on the Moon, but NEVER for ordinary soil on Earth... We also say Martian SOIL, but rarely Martian Grunt...

Posted by: Paolo Aug 25 2007, 03:26 PM

A detailed model of Fobos-Grunt on show at the MAKS 2007 airshow in Moscow
http://www.federalspace.ru/NewsDoSele.asp?NEWSID=2394

Posted by: IM4 Aug 28 2007, 01:26 PM

And some more FG-related stuff from MAKS 2007 airshow!
1)
http://img120.imageshack.us/my.php?image=img4893oi9.jpghttp://img179.imageshack.us/my.php?image=img4895ks9.jpghttp://img518.imageshack.us/my.php?image=img5045gz3.jpghttp://img513.imageshack.us/my.php?image=img5047lp1.jpg
FG global view, Return spacecraft with cameras (?) and top view of Return spacecraft and Descent Module
2)
http://img179.imageshack.us/my.php?image=yinhuopostervn6.jpghttp://img440.imageshack.us/my.php?image=fgchinesenf8.jpg
Yinhuo poster from China Aerospace. The latest version of the FG/Yinhuo spacecrafts atop of propulsion module as extracted from another poster.
3)
http://rapidshare.com/files/51823248/FG.pdf.html from NPO Lavochkin (PDF, 6 Mb), scanned to jpg's. Russian+English, a kind of summary for Fobos Grunt mission.

Posted by: volcanopele Aug 28 2007, 06:44 PM

So Grunt roughly translates to "regolith"?

Posted by: nprev Aug 28 2007, 06:57 PM

I'm thinking "grunt" may well best translate to "ground"; the two words are homophonic, and seem to refer to something more conceptually substantial than just soil.

Posted by: monitorlizard Sep 6 2007, 09:56 AM

It looks like the topic of the Phobos surface dust layer hasn't been discussed here in great detail, and it seems to me to be a serious problem for Phobos-Grunt. The best reference I have is pretty old, Sept. 1998(antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap980914.html). It states "recent photographs of Phobos have indicated that a layer of fine powder estimated to be a meter deep covers the whole surface." That refers to MOC images and I think TES measurements made at that time.

The photos I've seen of Phobos-Grunt models don't show any special features to overcome this problem, such as very high/long legs to stand above the dust. I suppose the spacecraft could do something like fire its descent engines for a prolonged period to blow away dust at its landing site, but I can't imagine enough fuel would be aboard for a technique like that.

Maybe I'm missing something. Perhaps the above quote is too simplistic, and the dust layer is much thinner on some parts of Phobos. Or maybe the meter-thick dust estimate has been modified or refuted since 1998. If not, I don't see how Phobos-Grunt could land successfully.

Posted by: Big_Gazza Sep 6 2007, 10:30 AM

Regarding the idea of deep dust on Phobos, I dont think we need worry too much. Prior to any lunar landings, the same was said about the Moon, yet Luna 9 dispelled that idea. Similarly, touchdowns by NEAR at Eros and by Hayabusa MUSES-C at Itokawa have demonstrated that asteroids have solid surfaces.

Posted by: AndyG Sep 6 2007, 10:55 AM

Sinking into dust will not be a problem.

There don't seem to be any publicly available figures for the likely mass of the lander, but let's be generous and call it 1000kg. The recent mockup suggests three splayed landing pads of around 40cm diameter.

The surface gravity of Phobos peaks at 0.0084 m/s^2.

Taken together that's a Phobos ground pressure of around 22N/m^2 (say 0.003 psi, in old units). About a thousandth of a human's ground pressure standing on the Earth.

Andy

Posted by: karolp Sep 11 2007, 11:56 AM

I wonder if anyone has come across this Phobos-Grunt video on YouTube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W0cUvK0Dgy8

It gives a detailed timeline of events in Russian as well as details on how the orbit insertion and extraction of samples are going to be peformed.

Posted by: Zvezdichko Sep 13 2007, 09:03 PM

wait... is it going to land on Earth like Genesis - no parachutes, just crash landing?

Posted by: SpaceListener Sep 13 2007, 11:30 PM

The technique of Earth landing the Martian sample is the simplest of all. The capsule must have a stronger material than the Genesis ones.

Posted by: Pavel Sep 14 2007, 12:31 AM

The difference is that Genesis wasn't designed to land the way it did. However, I can imagine that some people will be very afraid of the possibility that the container breaks and the Martian bugs get out and kill all of us

Posted by: Ankle-bone12 Oct 8 2007, 07:51 PM

This frightens me, I don't know why. It's a relativly untested method that has'nt seemed to work very well in the past.

Posted by: nprev Oct 9 2007, 02:14 AM

Yeah...lithobraking augmented by a bit of atmospheric deceleration! I'm very surprised that there isn't at least a drogue (maybe a ribbon chute?) for vertical stabilization during the terminal landing phase; that reentry vehicle looks less than aerodynamically stable, unless it's really bottom-heavy.

Posted by: djellison Oct 9 2007, 07:27 AM

No chute is the simplest possible design. You build it like a tank, and then you don't have to depend on any chute, drogue, mortar, circuitry, deployment, accelerometres, software etc etc etc.

I'm all for it.

Doug

Posted by: GravityWaves Oct 9 2007, 09:42 AM

Wasn't there the idea to one day convert the Mars Moons into a kind of space-station, something similar to the idea of Asteroid mining. Living inside on of these asteroids would provide astronauts with radiation shielding and the iron/carbonaceous materials could be extracted for building other items. In the far future it could possibly be converted into a station for fueling other spacecraft.

Posted by: nprev Oct 10 2007, 01:26 AM

Spoken just like a man who, let's say, is trying to design an EDL system for a balloon payload...

Posted by: konangrit Dec 4 2007, 09:55 AM

Chen Changya of the Shanghai Institute of Satellite Engineering recently gave an update on the progress of Yinguo 1 at a forum on aerospace technology.

http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2007-12/04/content_6295793.htm



http://www.china.org.cn/english/China/234197.htm

Posted by: IM4 Dec 23 2007, 02:45 PM

Good news everyone!
Presentations from recent IKI international forum are now available: http://www.iki.rssi.ru/oct4/2007/index_e.htm.
Presentations feature Phobos-Grunt science program, METNET mission plans, latest SPICAV/SOIR/VIRTIS results, Venus exploration perspectives from ESA/ROSCOSMOS, some Rosetta and mars rovers related stuff plus a bit of planetology.

Posted by: Zvezdichko Jun 24 2008, 08:52 AM

http://www.russianspaceweb.com/phobos_grunt_preflight.html - an article by Anatoly Zak:

1. Phobos-Grunt too big to launch with Soyuz-2, the launcher probably will be a Zenit rocket.

2. The project remains on track for launch in 2009

Posted by: jamescanvin Jun 24 2008, 09:25 AM

Finnish Mars Lander??!!

EDIT: Ah, the MetNet demonstrator - forgot about that

Posted by: Zvezdichko Jun 24 2008, 09:27 AM

They're referring to MetNet, actually.

http://www.unmannedspaceflight.com/index.php?showtopic=3896 - here's a thread I wrote about it.

Posted by: tedstryk Jun 24 2008, 12:44 PM

Good, maybe they thought better of sticking MetNet on a Volna.

Posted by: Zvezdichko Jun 24 2008, 01:09 PM

Looks like they really want to send a Mars lander. This makes the 2009 Mars missions worrisome - all Mars landings will include yet untested technologies.

As for MetNet, it seems they will enter the amosphere in a ballistic trajectory. After that... I don't know. These landers even don't have parachutes.

Posted by: tedstryk Jun 24 2008, 01:16 PM

They did drop tests this spring and it went flawlessly. That is probably why they wanted to go ahead and send it. Of course, this little lander/penetrator is only a test for the MetNet mission, so it, in a sense, is the proving mission.

Posted by: Zvezdichko Jun 24 2008, 01:23 PM

In my opinion drop tests are not of much value. For example, the parachute and the airbags of Beagle 2 were successfully tested (though it's a controversial subject). The systems of Deep Space 2 were also tested very successfully (I have watched a whole documentary about the tests of these penetrators). But Mars is different than the Earth. We have a thinner atmosphere, fluctuations may fool the onboard computer...

Posted by: tedstryk Jun 24 2008, 01:42 PM

Well, like you said earlier, MetNet doesn't have a parachute, and it doesn't have much else to do on the way down, so a computer problem is less likely. The main purpose of the drop tests is to make sure it still worked after a hard hit. Mars does have a thinner atmosphere and different conditions, which is the whole reason for the precursor mission - send one and see if it works under real conditions before they send a whole network of MetNet landers. In a sense, this precursor is an in situ test, but one that might yield a little science if it works. I do wish they had gone with the original plan to send two or three landers. I would hate to think that they had a perfectly good lander that was unlucky and hit a sharp rock (the Russians should know not to test their Mars luck, because they don't have any).

Posted by: Zvezdichko Jun 24 2008, 01:55 PM

the Russians should know not to test their Mars luck, because they don't have any.
This is the best I read in your post

To be honest, I'm worried because I see they still work somehow in... a Soviet manner (can't find a better word) - I mean - they insist to launch the mission in 2009 at any cost, for example. Well, sometimes it's good, because I hate delays. However, if Mars' 73 had been delayed to 1975, they would have been the first on the planet.
Hope you understood me.

Posted by: tedstryk Jun 24 2008, 03:12 PM

You know, NASA and the Russians have the opposite problem. NASA will often scrimp on instruments, sending probes without many instruments (DAWN with no magnetometer, the MERs). The good side is that such spacecraft are reliable, the bad side is that there are measurements that scientists really wanted that they can't take. The Russians, on the other hand, seem to try to strap every last thing they can to the mission. I wish they would just launch an orbiter (maybe the much-needed SAR orbiter that never seems to make the cut) with maybe a penetrator or two. But having sent 10 Mars missions (I know there were more, but I am ignoring launch failures, since those failures have nothing to do with the complexity of the actual spacecraft) and not having one full success, one would think that they wouldn't try to jump straight in with an orbiter-drop-off Chinese orbiter-lander-Phobos landing and ascent-Phobos sample-return mission (Of the often-cited "successes," The Mars-2 orbiter was in the right orbit but couldn't sent telemetry, Mars-3 could send limited telemetry (not for long enough to send pictures at resolution better than 250-line mode) and was in an orbit that only took it near the planet every 18 days, Mars-5 failed after only 9 days with many of its science goals unfinished and with 75 percent of its film unexposed).

Of course, it has been in the pipeline for a while, and since it is the only mission (along with MetNet) that has enjoyed any serious backing until very recently, it is understandable that there are a lot of goals for it. Incidentally, a lot of the hardware is leftover from Phobos '89, so at its core, this may be the last Soviet mission.

Posted by: Zvezdichko Jun 24 2008, 03:25 PM

But if we look at the subject with optimism, we have an example how a complex mission may be near to success. For example, Hayabusa - it landed twice, took off, there were engine problems + MINERVA failed to achieve a soft landing. Phobos-Grunt may be more successful than Phobos 2 (which indeed sent some data, including images).

Posted by: Mariner9 Jun 24 2008, 03:40 PM

I think reffering to it as "working in a Soviet manner" is a good way to put it.

It often seemed that the US would achieve something in their space program that the Russians had not done, then the Russian responce was to point at something else. So, the Russians fail to make any manned lunar flights, declare that orbital stations (aka Salyut) are the true destiny of manned spaceflight, and in the meantime "did we mention our vigorous unmmanned mars exploration efforts? Heck, you Americans are only sending an orbiter (Mariner 8,9) but we are sending orbiters AND landers (Mars 2,3). " So, not only point in a different direction, but stack multiple firsts into a single mission.

They would also load down a mission with lots of elements, to try to make up for a previous failure. So the Phobos missions were a failure, but the next mission includes multiple elements designed to impress everyone with the scope of the mission, and Mars 96 is born.


Phobos Grunt seems to be carrying on that tradition very well. No unmanned Mars shots in 13 years, and the last even partially sucessful mission was 20 years ago. That partially sucessful mission was merely to rendesvous and drop a payload onto Phobos. Well, well, we are going to do better than that on this second try, and return a sample to Earth. Oh, and take along a Chinese satellite. Oh, hey, and take along a Mars lander. ..... We thought about taking a tourist, but decided to leave that for the next mission.

Posted by: tedstryk Jun 24 2008, 08:30 PM

Another thing that makes me optimistic is that the weakest link in the Soviet program was a result of bad computers, something that will likely no longer be an issue.

Posted by: mps Jun 25 2008, 07:19 AM

I've always wondered, how can a single Soyuz launch a Phobos sample return lander, a Mars orbiter and possibly a penetrator. Well, it seems it can't.

Posted by: Zvezdichko Jun 25 2008, 11:04 AM

I liked to see they chose Zenith, because in my opinion Proton is very unreliable.

Posted by: Big_Gazza Jun 25 2008, 11:13 AM

I think Ted has hit the nail on the head here. Computer hardware failure (and software upload control protocols) had doomed every Soviet Mars probe since the Mars 4/5/6/7 flotilla (and maybe caused the Mars 3 orbiter to drop the datalink from its lander thus lose the 1st pics from the Martian surface...)

Lets hope that this time around some bright-spark of an electronics factory manager doesnt have a brilliant cost-cutting idea like using aluminium instead of gold in IC fabrication... (shakes head, sobs quietly)

Posted by: djellison Jun 25 2008, 11:25 AM

http://www.geocities.com/launchreport/reliability2008.txt

If you take all Zenit variations and all Proton variations - the Zenit comes out at 81.5% success rate, the Proton 92.3%

In the last 12 months, Zenit has 4 launches with one failure, Proton 3 launches with one failure.
http://www.geocities.com/launchreport/stats2008.txt

The Proton is not unreliable, especially when compared to Zenit.

Doug

Posted by: mps Jun 25 2008, 11:30 AM

As far as I understand, they will launch Phobos-Grunt on a Zenit 2M/Fregat, which is upgraded Zenit 2. According to Wikipedia, 6 out of total 37 Zenit 2 launches were failures (the single Zenit 2M launch to date was successful). Not very impressive.

EDIT: Doug was faster. But I must point out that the most recent Zenit failures happened with Zenit 3SL (I think). Roscosmos doesn't use SeaLauch services.
OT: I myself trust only one Russian launcher: Soyuz. I hope Angara will change that.

Posted by: Big_Gazza Jun 25 2008, 11:32 AM

To be entirely honest, I don't know if Zenit is more reliable than Proton. Admittedly there have been 5 successful launches since the Jan07 failure, but Proton was itself successful on 6 occasions between its failures in Sep07 and Mar08.

Every launch is a numbers game (unless the vehicle in question is a Delta 2, or maybe a Cosmos 3M) and there are no guarantees.

Posted by: Zvezdichko Jun 25 2008, 11:37 AM

Actually in the last 12 months we have 6 Proton launches + 2 failures...

Fregat is a good stage, I don't expect an upper stage malfunction. It all depends on the performance of the first two stages.

mps: Yeah, not very impressive.

Posted by: SFJCody Jun 26 2008, 05:52 AM

This is one good aspect of rising fuel prices- Russia has loads of petro-rubles flowing into planetary spaceflight, enough to cover any cost overruns in getting concepts from powerpoint to the launch pad. Now if only we could persuade the Gulf states that planetary exploration is more important for national prestige than http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al_Burj http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mubarak_Tower http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mile_High_Tower...

Posted by: mps Jun 26 2008, 06:43 AM

Yes, but in the same time U.S. and Europe will have less bucks for UMSF

Posted by: Zvezdichko Jul 5 2008, 07:34 AM

An update on laspace.ru (Using the Google translator, bad English):

Posted by: Paolo Jul 7 2008, 01:38 PM

In case you forgot, the ill-fated Phobos 1 was launched exactly 20 years ago on 7 July 1988 http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/nmc/spacecraftDisplay.do?id=1988-058A

Posted by: tolis Jul 7 2008, 02:43 PM

Hello to everyone,

I am new to this mailing list.

I just wanted to point out the Phobos-Grunt mission is similar to the original Phobos project 20 years ago in one other
significant way: the quality of the launch window.

This is usually quantified by the "hyperbolic velocity" at departure and arrival, in other words
the amount of energy (or fuel) that the spacecraft needs to expend in order to slip into the
correct trajectory for the Earth-Mars portion of the trip, and the energy at arrival needed
to break into orbit around Mars when it gets there. Trajectory designers usually look
for the smallest hyperbolic velocities possible in order to maximise the mass of the spacecraft.

For Phobos 2 those were about 3.5 km/sec at departure from Earth on 12/07/1988 and 2.6 km/sec for arrival at Mars
at 29/01/2989. For Phobos-Grunt, a departure on 05/10/2009 and arrival at 29/08/2010 gives hyp. velocities
of 3.3 km/sec and 2.5 km/sec, quite similar to those of Phobos 2.

One other thing: the Phobos 2 trajectory allowed for an almost equatorial arrival at Mars. In other words, the spacecraft
could (and did) settle into the equatorial plane of Mars directly from its hyperbolic arrival trajectory. This is useful
(as in "fuel-saving") if you are trying to rendezvous with a satellite in an equatorial orbit, such as Phobos and is not
necessarily true for *every* launch opportunity to Mars. It is true for the 2009 Phobos-Grunt window however.

Hopefully the above will be of some use.

Tolis.

Posted by: charborob Jul 15 2008, 04:09 AM

Here's an article about Phobos-Grunt:
http://www.marsdaily.com/reports/Russia_To_Study_Martian_Moons_Once_Again_999.html
Launch is planned for October 2009.

Posted by: Paolo Jul 27 2008, 02:07 PM

The latest issue of Air & Space magazine hashttp://www.airspacemag.com/space-exploration/Mission_Possible.html about Phobos Grunt

Posted by: Mark6 Jul 30 2008, 04:25 PM

Can somebody explain this line in the article:

Why is Phobos easier to access than Deimos?

Posted by: Dominik Jul 30 2008, 05:12 PM

I think it's simply because it's nearest to Mars.

Posted by: SpaceListener Jul 30 2008, 05:28 PM

My toughts are:

• Phobos have much less dust and debris on its surface than Deimos because of its close orbit to Mars where the planet's gravity would tend to pull debris off the moon. This is a important factor for a easier landing and work with the less dusty surface.
• Both moons have low escape velocities, Phobos is only 12 m/sec and Deimos is even lower. Better with Phobos than Deimos because Phobos will let the spacecraft to have easier landing and surface control during the sampling due to its little greater gravity.
• The orbit velocity of Phobos is higher than Deimos: Phobos orbits Mars with a period of 7.3 hours, less than a Martian day and Deimos orbits Mars in 30.3 hours. Hence, when the spacecraft Phobos-Grunt approaches to Mars, it will need to carry less carburant to reduce the speed. Most Mars' orbiters loop around Mars within 12 hours.

Hope that others would contribute a much better reasons.

Posted by: Paolo Aug 2 2008, 05:42 PM

From http://www.laspace.ru/rus/news.php#228 translated by Babelfish:

29.07.2008
Delegation from C.P.R. (Chinese Peoples' Republic) in [FGUP] “[NPO] of the name Of [s].[A].[Lavochkina]”

Last week [FGUP] “[NPO] of the name Of [s].[A].[Lavochkina]” visited delegation from C.P.R. headed by the leader of the Chinese national space administration Of [sun] [Layyanem]. Encounter took place with the participation of the representatives of federal Space Agency, specialists [NPO] [im]. Of [s].[A].[Lavochkina], RNII (Scientific Research Institute of Jet Propulsion) KP, OKB MEI.

In the course of encounter the prospects of the collaboration of two states in the peaceful mastery of outer space were discussed: outer space exploration in the scientific and technical spheres. Among the key items of collaboration - study of Mars and its satellite of Phoebus. In the composition of automatic spacecraft “Phoebus- ground”, of created in [NPO] [im]. [S].[A].[Lavochkina], to Mars will leave Chinese micro-satellite.

Design project leader and Director-General OF [FGUP] “[NPO] [im]. Of [s].[A].[Lavochkina]” Of [g].[M].[Polishchuk] acquainted guests with the basic directions of the activity of enterprise and designated the key moments of the participation of Chinese side in the project “Phoebus- ground”.

The visit of the new shop, where assembling and testing the automatic automatic spacecraft of scientific designation occurs caused great interest in participants in the encounter. The special attention of gathering was given to the section of assembling KA “Phoebus- ground”. The questions, which are concerned its construction and tests, answered the first deputy chief of OKB, chief designer on the theme Of [m].[B].[Martynov].

International collaboration in the peaceful mastery of space contributes to scientific and technical progress, modernization of rocket-space technology and to development of contemporary civilization as a whole.

Posted by: rlorenz Aug 3 2008, 09:35 AM

Interesting picture - looks very confrontational - bear guys lined up on one side, dragon guys lined up
on the other. Nice wall of vegetation between them. I'd suggest you don't make rapid technical
progress this way.

Posted by: Paolo Aug 3 2008, 11:44 AM

http://www.kcn.ru/tat_en/science/ans/journals/rasj_cnt/07_2_5/vkl2.jpg of the Phobos Grunt mission profile
http://www.kcn.ru/tat_en/science/ans/journals/rasj_cnt/07_2_5/vkl1.jpg, including Mars Grunt, Luna Glob, Venera D etc.

Posted by: Paolo Sep 9 2008, 06:29 PM

http://www.lpre.de/resources/articles/RDIME_products.pdf about the engine hardware on Fobos Grunt (page 14)

Posted by: Phil Stooke Oct 16 2008, 03:35 PM

There's some new information on Phobos from Mars Express here:

http://www.esa.int/esaCP/SEMB82TG7MF_index_0.html


This includes an image showing the Phobos-Grunt landing site candidates. Beware of the text on the landing site link, though - it says "the Russian Federal Space Agency is now considering to move the landing location slightly to the north of the previous one, to a safer area located between 7°-21°S and 214°-233°W." It's actually 7 to 21 north, not south. This also puts their landing sites in the area seen in the highest resolution Viking images, at roughly 20 north, 235 west.

I've attached the Viking image - a mosaic of two frames, blurred a bit by motion, with the sites added as white dots. The Viking images are still the best for this area.

Phil

Posted by: Phil Stooke Nov 6 2008, 02:49 PM

More very useful information on Phobos-Grunt landing sites in an abstract by Sasha Basilevsky at the Vernadsky-Brown Microsymposium, held a couple of weeks ago in Moscow:

http://www.planetology.ru/browsefiles.php

(I gave the link to the abstract page, not just Sasha's abstract, so you can see the others - check out the really good one on Lunokhod-2)

Watch out for the map of PG landing sites, though - it shows the old ones.

Phil

Posted by: peter59 Nov 6 2008, 05:57 PM

Abstract conclusion : All Lunokhod 2 panoramas were digitized.
I hope that soon we will take a virtual tour inside the Le Monnier crater.

Posted by: SFJCody Dec 5 2008, 10:56 PM

I wonder when (if?) Phobos-Grunt will get a delay announcement.

Posted by: Paolo Dec 8 2008, 04:41 PM

Otherwise, F-G will be th only Mars mission of 2009...

Posted by: SpaceListener Dec 8 2008, 06:14 PM

Not yet I have heard of this. This is not only a Russian project but too of China. China will request assistance from Russia to launch the Yinghuo-1 Chinese-made Mars probe. Hence Phobos-Grunt and Yinghuo-1 will travel together to Mars.

From economics perspective, I suspect that Russia will have more trouble in financing the project since Russia depends upon much of oil earnings. China will assist the financial to Russia to accomplish the joint mission if Russia request for help.

http://www.marsdaily.com/reports/China_To_Launch_Probe_To_Mars_With_Russian_Help_In_2009_999.html

Hope that this would be a space streaming news during 2009.

Posted by: Paolo Dec 8 2008, 06:39 PM

According to thttp://www.roscosmos.ru/NewsDoSele.asp?NEWSID=4601 (dated 29 october, in russian) development is proceeding is schedule

Posted by: IM4 Dec 9 2008, 07:49 PM

According to insiders, Phobos-Grunt will also be delayed by 2 years. That's not a financial, but rather engineering issues with spacecraft bus "Navigator", first of its kind.

Posted by: Paolo Dec 13 2008, 09:50 AM

According to this week's issue of French "Air et Cosmos" it seems that the 2009 launch window is no longer achievable and the mission will be delayed to 2011.
For any other member who can read French: go find a copy of Air and Cosmos because this issue (no 2151, 12 december) has a very good 2-page article on Lavochkin's lunar plans!

Posted by: Paolo Dec 13 2008, 02:04 PM

Doubts doubts doubts...
I was wondering about the latest F-G/YH-1 stack configuration, which look something http://img440.imageshack.us/my.php?image=fgchinesenf8.jpg
assuming that a mission profile "à la Fobos" is used, the Fregat stage at bottom places the stack into Mars orbit and then circularizes the orbit to one close to that of Phobos. After this, F-G and YH-1 are released. Does this mean that YH-1 will not enter the announced 800 x 80,000 km orbit but will instead enter a circular one 6000 km above the planet?
I see no way YH-1 can be released from this stack just after orbit insertion as initially announced, unless the Fregat is used only to enter Mars orbit and the circularization is carried out by F-G onboard engine...
any idea? suggestions?
Of course, http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20081205/sc_nm/us_china_mars;_ylt=Av82F1f.bT7gfzFd7JapQPEhANEA suggests that YH-1 will be placed in an eccentric orbit, as I can see no way a circular orbit can have 8.8 hours eclipses.
There is something wrong with either the mission profile or the stack images, or the article...

Posted by: mps Dec 13 2008, 08:31 PM

It seems to me that Fregat is used only to leave Earth orbit, MOI and following maneuvers are handled by the s/c itself: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W0cUvK0Dgy8
Of course, this is quite old video and doesn't feature Yinghuo-1, so it all could have changed by now.

Posted by: Paolo Dec 13 2008, 08:51 PM

That's true, but in this case the position of YH-1 would interfere with the firing of the engine at MOI

Posted by: ugordan Dec 13 2008, 09:22 PM

I don't think Fregat can be used to brake at Mars, it's a launch vehicle upper stage similar to a Centaur on Atlas and it's not meant to spend months in deep space.

This implies YH-1 would have to separate before MOI or would have to be placed at a different location.

Posted by: Paolo Dec 13 2008, 10:01 PM

Actually, it was used for MOi and circularization on Fobos 2

Posted by: ugordan Dec 13 2008, 10:30 PM

As far as I see, the present Fregat stage was derived from the Fobos Fregat, yes, but that doesn't necessarily translate into ability to operate in space for months. It may be able to do so, but heritage alone doesn't guarantee it. The propellants are indeed storable, though.

Posted by: IM4 Dec 14 2008, 10:25 AM

Actually, Paolo is right. Booster will remain attached to FG-YH1 till Mars and will perform some part of MOI and there is nothing special in the booster design in sense of deep space travelling. The main reason for that strange assembling was FG unability to perform MOI with YH1 attached to it. Mass budget was broken so the only solution was to utilize Zenit launcher instead of Soyuz as well as to fly booster together with its payload to Mars.

Posted by: ugordan Dec 14 2008, 11:35 AM

I stand fully corrected!

Posted by: Paolo Dec 14 2008, 11:42 AM

Thanks. It all makes sense now

Posted by: Paolo Jan 3 2009, 11:11 AM

Details (in Russian) on the status of Fobos-Grunt and in particular its payload is available in the 2008 activity report of IKI.
See http://www.iki.rssi.ru/annual/2008/ and in particular http://www.iki.rssi.ru/annual/2008/R32_OKR_NIR-08.htm
Also includes a section on MetNet and another on Venera-D (also called "Venera-Glob") and on a perspective Mercury lander using Fobos-Grunt technology.
There appears to be nothing on Luna-Glob, however

Posted by: Zvezdichko Jan 3 2009, 11:24 AM

... and "Lyulin-Phobos" is not listed amongst the instruments. Weird.

Posted by: Zvezdichko Jan 3 2009, 12:01 PM

OK, as I promised, here are the instruments scheduled to fly aboard Phobos-Grunt next year:

Chromato-Mass-Spectrometer - it is a complicated instrument and contains a Chromatograph (collaboration with France and Germany), a Mass-spectrometer, Thermal analyzer ( collaboration with China)

Subcomplex-Scientific-Apparatus - It contains several other instuments and amongst them we have a star tracker, the navigation system ... and ... SURPRISE! A Mossbauer spectrometer (collaboration with Germany)!

Gamma spectrometer, Neutron spectrometer (A gamma and a neutron spectrometer flew aboard Mars-96).

IR-spectrometer

Micrometeoroid detector

Detector of cosmic dust

Plasma experiment (looks like a similar experiment flew aboard Mars-96)

Long-wavelenght planet radar (what is this?)

Thermodetector

Posted by: Paolo Jan 3 2009, 12:07 PM

Details of F-G payload can be found in this http://arc.iki.rssi.ru/oct4/2007/ppt/02_01_A_Zakharov.pdf
Note that the Bulgarian instrument is not mentioned either.

Posted by: Zvezdichko Jan 3 2009, 12:15 PM

There's something that disturbs me even more.

(deleted) How is it going to launch this time? Will they switch back to a Soyuz rocket or they will use a Zenit (Proton rocket)

Posted by: Paolo Jan 3 2009, 12:29 PM

According to the IKI report, Italian participation also is indoubt, due to financing problems from our space agency (which has just undergone a complete restructuring and refocusing, putting many projects at risk).

Posted by: Zvezdichko Jan 3 2009, 12:39 PM

Yeah, TIM and DIAMOND may not fly at all

MetNet also won't fly at all...

Will Yuinghuo-1 fly with Phobos-Grunt? There's nothing mentioned there.

Posted by: Zvezdichko Jan 3 2009, 03:18 PM

OK, I got in touch with our local team working on Phobos-Grunt.

Everything is nominal. On the website of IKI are listed only the scientific instruments. However, Lulin-Phobos is an official instrument and it's being developed in collaboration with IMBP-RAN.

So ... everything is nominal and we are on track. And Lulin-Phobos will fly!

Posted by: Zvezdichko Jan 4 2009, 02:36 PM

More and more publications started to appear on Russian websites:

http://www.vesti.ru/doc.html?id=238991

Russia intends to obtain samples from Phobos!

It's mentioned that the sample-return capsule has no parachutes (as some of us already know).

The launch of Phobos-Grunt is possible to occur as early as 2009.

Posted by: Hungry4info Jan 4 2009, 07:52 PM

As far as I know, that's been a primary objective from the start. It isn't exactly news.

If I understood the article correctly, they claim that the landing of Fobos-Grunt on the surface of Phobos will be the first time a spacecraft has landed on the moon of another planet. (Either Titan isn't a moon, or Saturn's not a planet).

They also claim something about thousands of g's when re-entering the atmosphere of Earth.

Posted by: sci44 Jan 4 2009, 10:56 PM

FULL INLINE QUOTE REMOVED - ADMIN

Ok, but its interesting to note that its scarcely reported in Western mainstream media - in fact I am pretty certain Phobos-Grunt sample-return has not been reported on the BBC transmitted media (non internet) - so it could be news, at least for some. I will also give the Russians credit for not giving up on a Mars mission, even after setbacks and failures, unlike others. Phobos return was also put forward as a UK mission at one stage.

The fact is, if they pull this off, it will be a bit of a coup..

Posted by: Zvezdichko Jan 6 2009, 08:37 AM

http://www.marsdaily.com/reports/China-Russia_Mars_mission_set_for_takeoff_999.html

Phobos-Grunt scheduled to take off in October.

There is some more information about the Chinese subsatellite:

Also, there's some information that Chang'e 2 may launch this year. (However, after the almost total silence surrounding Chang-e 1 I already lost interest in this yet another orbiter - at least till Chang-e lander lands).

Posted by: Zvezdichko Jan 22 2009, 11:05 PM

http://www.vesti.ru/doc.html?id=244836&cid=10

Team reports they are on schedule and they are still going to launch this year.

It's confirmed that Phobos-Grunt will carry microorganisms.

Posted by: Paolo Jan 24 2009, 08:30 AM

Interesting video. There are nice shots of the probe, its Fregat stage and of the YH-1 "cage". Note also that the video confirms that Zenith will be used as a launcher instead of Soyuz-Fregat.
The two men interviewed are Lavochkin's Georgi Polischuk and IKI's Lev Zelenyi. The man playing with Phobos' model is not identified.

Posted by: New Ocean Jan 26 2009, 05:20 PM

This has to be one of the most daring missions in the history of deep space exploration. And all for what, half the price of the one season Phoenix? Maybe there is something to be said for faster better cheaper, that is if it works. Which it probably wont

Posted by: Zvezdichko Jan 26 2009, 07:06 PM

USSR has experience in sample return missions. i remain optimistic...

Posted by: mps Jan 26 2009, 07:43 PM

I suspect its lower cost has little to do with faster-cheaper-better approach. The labor costs in Russia are presumably much lower than in U.S.

Posted by: tedstryk Jan 27 2009, 04:21 AM

There is also, from what I understand, some Phobos-88 hardware being used.

Posted by: elakdawalla Jan 27 2009, 05:59 PM

Really? That would put Phoenix to shame, in terms of reuse of mothballed hardware. I guess it depends on how much hardware you're talking about -- there are other missions that used leftover bits from other missions. Notably the Cassini WAC which uses optics built as flight spares for Voyager.

--Emily

Posted by: SFJCody Jan 27 2009, 09:15 PM

Wasn't the Voyager imaging system itself copied from Mariner 10's imager? Spaceflight is full of hand-me-downs! IIRC Voyager was originally going to have something similar to the Pioneer 10/11 Imaging Photopolarimeter

Posted by: Enceladus75 Jan 28 2009, 02:50 AM

And wasn't Magellan's main radio dish a flight spare from the Voyagers? It makes sense to use old or mothballed spacecraft hardware if it's in perfectly good order, to reduce costs. Galileo went for a new and risky umbrella type radio dish which ended up failing. I doubt that design will ever be used again.

From what we learned from Voyager's stunningly beautiful images, it would have been criminal to have done that.



I wish Phobos Grunt every success!

Posted by: dvandorn Jan 28 2009, 05:28 AM

Actually, that deployable umbrella-dish antenna design wasn't new for Galileo, it had been used dozens of times on big communications satellites. It was considered pretty low-risk, it had worked pretty much every time it had been used.

Galileo's antenna failed, more than likely, because its deployment mechanism was lubricated, the antenna stowed, and then the whole thing was unexpectedly put in storage for something like six years. The antenna was never unstowed and "exercised" after storage prior to flight; the lubricants apparently dried out and the deployment mechanism stuck irretrievably.

There's normally nothing wrong with using backup flight hardware on later vehicles. You just have to make certain it still works...

-the other Doug

Posted by: Geert Feb 3 2009, 04:02 AM

Posted on request of James Oberg:

Additional info received from James Oberg:



Regards,


Geert

Posted by: Pavel Feb 4 2009, 12:06 AM

Here's my translation. I tried to keep all ambiguity of the original, so please don't blame me

Earth bacteria to be sent to Mars satellite

Russia prepares a unique space expedition. An interplanetary spacecraft is going to a Mars' satellite in October this year, said the head of the Russian Space agency Anatoly Perminov. Nobody has ever got to Phobos. Two attempts by the Soviet spacecraft failed. And now Russia decides to conquer Phobos, surprising the Universe.

Lavochkin design bureau, where the Russian Moon program was born, it now finishing assembly of the new interplanetary spacecraft. It weighs almost 10 tonnes.

The worst days of total lack of money are hopefully over. Russian researchers are getting ready to encounter "Fear" and "Dread", that is the Mars satellites, Phobos and Deimos. The Russian spacecraft will fly by Deimos to land on Phobos. No projects of that scale have existed since the Soviet days.

The satellite of Mars looks like a giant potato, 20-30 kilometers in size. The hardest part is to find a place for landing on its crater covered surface.

Unlike the big planets, the asteroid (sic) lacks gravity (sic), so the spacecraft can simply bounce off its surface. "We need to press it during the landing, or it will bound around," says Leo Zeleny, head of the Space Research Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences.

After the successful landing, 11 months after the launch, the spacecraft starts collecting the ground samples. For the first time in history, scientists will have an opportunity to study composition of such a large asteroid. The ground sample will move to the return capsule and will go back to Earth. The main station will continue researching Phobos. It will air TV pictures of the small planet's (sic) surface. The bacteria sent to live on the asteroid will return to Earth with the ground sample.

"We'll see how that bacterial culture will survive the three year long spaceflight, thus testing the theory of panspermia, that is spead of life through space," Leo Zeleny said.

The launch of "Phobos-Grunt" by the Zenit rocket is planned for October this year. That's when the launch window opens for getting to Mars faster.

The developers of the project are in a hurry, as the next window will only open two years later. "We are following the schedule. The schedule is tight. We are working in two shifts now," said Georgy Polischuk, the general constructor and the general director of the Lavochkin design bureau.

The main part of the spacecraft is the engine block "Flagman", the newest Russian development, which will form the foundation for our further space expeditions. "After Phobos, there will be two more Mars spacecraft based on the same hardware, with landing and a rover. And three missions to the Moon. And to Venus in year 2015," Georgy Polischuk said.

The money for the planetary exploration has been provided. The Mars rovers were built earlier. They have been collecting dust while waiting for the better days. The constructors are even sure that the global economic crisis won't disrupt the space plans.

Posted by: mps Feb 4 2009, 07:49 AM

A interesting article indeed. I think that the Universe is most surprised by the fact, that there are Russian Mars rovers collecting dust and waiting for better days. Actual flight hardware? It's hard for me to believe that. Maybe they are talking about prototypes?

Posted by: Alex Chapman Feb 4 2009, 08:37 PM

I don't find it too hard to believe that the Soviets designed rovers for Mars and even got as far as building flight hardware. When the old Soviet Union broke up and then Mars 96 failed on launch everything was just shelved with no money for the existing programs. What is hard to believe is that they might be thinking of going to the expense of launching a rover that's been in storage for 10 years or so and probably less capable than Sojourner. Lets all not forget that with all their attempts the Soviets have never had a Mars lander thats really worked.

Posted by: PhilCo126 Mar 6 2009, 03:20 PM

Probably some of us read the story of a Russian Biological experiment on ISS, well now it looks like that those bloodworms could be carried on Phobos Grunt as stated by Oleg Gusev


http://www.nias.affrc.go.jp/anhydrobiosis/Sleeping%20Chironimid/e-taisei.html

Well I guess they'll have to consider the probability of contaminating Mars' moon by introducing terrestrial biology to Phobos
As it's a sample return mission, they'll have to keep the sample and the bloodworm containers well separated

Posted by: Zvezdichko Mar 18 2009, 11:36 AM

http://www.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=205&start=1095

According to Novosti Kosmonavtiki work on the Chinese subsatellite has been completed...

Posted by: Zvezdichko Apr 8 2009, 08:46 AM

http://www.spectrum.ieee.org/apr09/8527

Russia to delay Martian Moon mission to 2011. I hope this is not true

Posted by: tedstryk Apr 8 2009, 09:00 AM

I am not sad about this. Given the rocket switch and all the complexity of this mission, the "launch on time, ready or not!" attitude seemed dangerously reminiscent of the Mars 4-7 and Phobos 1-2 missions. Also, this should allow a Metnet precursor mission to ride along.

Posted by: Zvezdichko Apr 8 2009, 09:15 AM

Yes, but if they don't launch this year, they may never launch. People are waiting to see the next giant leap, the new projects that will inspire people working in the space industry. The public is getting bored because of all these delays.

Posted by: tedstryk Apr 8 2009, 09:57 AM

Right, but better to let them get a little bored than to have a catastrophic failure. Besides, there is no comparable mission in development that would upstage it between then and now.

Posted by: Geert Apr 9 2009, 12:48 PM

Fully agree, too many missions have been lost in the past due to time-pressure with Mars96 as the ultimate example, the whole Phobos-Grunt situation was too me starting to smell like a repeat of Mars96. Better delay 2 years and take the time.

It is a pity these things tend to get more and more crowded with experiments and more and more ambitious. Just a 'repeat' of the original Phobos mission with a close approach and/or 'landing' on Phobos would already have been a big jump ahead.

I still believe in the original metnet idea, that would be a mission which is 'in reach' without too much futuristic hardware and too big a budget and which could deliver a lot of information and better understanding of Mars. It is a bit of a pity that now everybody seems to like to start building big sexy rovers and forget about those simple small metnet landers...

Posted by: remcook Apr 9 2009, 01:46 PM

Don't worry, MetNet will be back, maybe sooner than later.

Posted by: cbcnasa Apr 9 2009, 04:16 PM

I think the public gets bored shortly after a mission starts, we can see the value of the long term results and the importance of each new mission. A failed mission from having to rush and make a deadline is so damaging and the need to assure success requires a two year delay if needed.

Posted by: Vultur Apr 9 2009, 10:29 PM

I'd much rather have a 2011-launched success than a 2009-launched failure; still, I was rather hoping that a successful sample return from Phobos might kick up plans for more ambitious Mars missions from the US and maybe Europe.

Posted by: Phil Stooke Apr 17 2009, 05:03 PM

Nice pic of a mockup.

Phil

Posted by: andrea Apr 26 2009, 05:43 AM

This article is not too positive:

http://www.spaceflightnow.com/news/n0904/25russia/

Posted by: Vultur Apr 27 2009, 05:58 AM

So there's still no official statement of the delay?

How reliable is it: is it just rumors at this point, or should we believe it? It seems from the article that it's just one person's speculation (admittedly someone who should know, but politics could be involved...)

Posted by: Zvezdichko May 5 2009, 04:13 PM

Russia refutes rumors that Phobos-Grunt will be delayed

http://www.roscosmos.ru/NewsDoSele.asp?NEWSID=6142
Roscosmos just announced that the information about delaying the mission Phobos-Grunt to 2011 is false. Everything is on track for launch this year.

Posted by: SpaceListener May 5 2009, 05:08 PM

Using English version, I still didn't find the above announcement.

Posted by: Paolo May 5 2009, 05:20 PM

same statement http://www.laspace.ru/rus/news.php#292 (in Russian)

Posted by: Zvezdichko May 5 2009, 05:44 PM

You know, foreign space agencies rarely publish information in English.

Posted by: ElkGroveDan May 5 2009, 06:50 PM

Not even in England?

Posted by: tedstryk May 5 2009, 07:50 PM

"What has appeared in a number of electronic media outlets, referencing anonymous sources, are reports concerning a delay of thel aunch date for the Phobos-Grunt automatic station. The press service of NPO Lavochkin reports that this information about the Phobos-Grunt automatic station is inaccurate.

The construction of this spacecraft is one of the highest priority tasks. The schedule has been stressed, but work on the complex Phobos-Grunt station is completely on schedule for the 2009 launch window. We consider reports of the need for a delay in electronic publications to not be fully accurate."

Posted by: nprev May 5 2009, 11:32 PM

From their lips to God's ears. We all want PG to happen!

Posted by: Vultur May 6 2009, 02:29 AM

Oh, thank goodness.

Let's hope this is honest, and not just one of those 'pretend everything is fine till the last moment' things.

Posted by: centsworth_II May 6 2009, 03:16 AM

A launch date can be honest and still not be met. Take MSL for example.

Posted by: Zvezdichko May 12 2009, 07:56 PM

A friend of mine informed me that all threads about Phobos-Grunt were deleted from the famous Russian forum Novosti Kosmonavtiki. There's no explaination given about why this happened.

But on the main page of the website:

http://www.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/content/news.shtml

... we read once again: "We don't fear that Phobos-Grut will be delayed to 2011". That's weird!

Posted by: monitorlizard May 19 2009, 12:14 PM

http://www.planetary.org/blog

Guest blogger Alan Stern has listed the Phobos-Grunt launch as being in August 2011. Just an assumption?

Posted by: Phil Stooke May 19 2009, 12:22 PM

A good summary from Alan, but (off topic for this thread, alas) Vesta is not twice the size of Enceladus! Tsk, Alan!

As for Phobos-Grunt, too bad about this year if the delay is real, but it has to be done right. At least it will give me more time to make ny new Phobos mosaic.

Phil

Posted by: remcook May 19 2009, 02:37 PM

From the ESA ESLAB conference last week, the official word was still a launch this year.

Posted by: tedstryk May 20 2009, 12:58 AM

Might that be a reference to mass?

Posted by: Phil Stooke May 20 2009, 03:20 AM

I suppose that is possible, Ted. If so, my apologies!

Phil

Posted by: tedstryk May 20 2009, 09:18 PM

Here we go. Enceladus is 1.1× 10^20 kg^4, Vesta is 2.7 × 10^20 kg^4

It isn't exact, but it is close enough that this may be what he was referring to.

Posted by: Zvezdichko May 27 2009, 07:06 PM

Novosti Kosmonavtiki announced that the Chinese subsatellite will arrive in Russia in June 17th. Work on the project continues according to plan and launch remains scheduled for October this year.

www.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru

Posted by: Zvezdichko May 30 2009, 09:51 AM

http://www.spacedaily.com/reports/China_to_launch_Mars_space_probe_999.html

Posted by: SpaceListener May 30 2009, 06:36 PM

I am still confused whether or not that Yinghuo-1 will be launched alone to Mars or with Phobos-Grunt? So far, I have not found any strong confirmation about the launch date of Phobos-Grunt between 2009 and 2011.

However, if the information from Yinghuo-1 is very certain, that means that Phobos-Grunt will also be traveling along with Yinghuo-1

Can someone able to clarify this case?

Posted by: redmoon May 30 2009, 07:33 PM

Sorry for my bad English, so only this Link:

http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2009-05/28/content_11449708.htm

Lauch for Phobos-Grunt and Yinghuo-1 is scheduled for autumn 2009.

Posted by: tedstryk May 31 2009, 08:07 PM

Yinghuo-1 will launch with Phobos-Grunt and ride to Mars with it, but they will seperate just before arrival and enter orbit on their own.

Posted by: Zvezdichko Jun 20 2009, 09:28 PM

http://www.roscosmos.ru/NewsDoSele.asp?NEWSID=6536

Bacterias from Earth will travel aboard the Russian interplanetary space probe "Phobos-Grunt" to Mars and back to Earth. Scientists hope to answer the question whether life cold arrive on Earth from space and survive (looks like it's all about panspermia).

"Phobos-Grunt" will deliver samples from the Martian moon Phobos. It's scheduled to launch in October 2009.

Posted by: redmoon Jun 20 2009, 09:38 PM

You can read more about the bacteria-experiment here :

http://www.planetary.org/programs/projects/life/

Posted by: SFJCody Jun 21 2009, 06:53 AM

Looks like there has been another update at http://www.russianspaceweb.com/phobos_grunt_preflight.html#lebourget

Posted by: Paolo Jun 21 2009, 09:41 AM

No one seems to have commented on this, but the Fobos Grunt model shown at Lavochkin's stand in le Bourget this year was quite different from that shown two years ago. And although a modified ascent stage was there, I don't understand where is the sample return capsule now.
My picture:

Posted by: Paolo Jun 23 2009, 06:53 PM

A nice article about Yinghuo from China's http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/90001/90781/90876/6674370.html
I am wondering when we will see an image of actual Chinese hardware...

Posted by: jsheff Jun 29 2009, 09:44 PM

Apparently the CNES will receive soil samples from Phobos:

http://www.aviationweek.com/aw/generic/story_channel.jsp?channel=space&id=news/Grunt062909.xml

According to this, the launch is still set for October...

Posted by: Paolo Aug 6 2009, 03:08 PM

Yinghuo reportedly arrived in Moscow http://english.cri.cn/6909/2009/08/06/2001s507109.htm

Posted by: tedstryk Aug 6 2009, 05:54 PM

Given that its orbit is so elliptical, maybe it will image some of the poorly studied areas of Deimos.

Posted by: lyford Aug 6 2009, 06:42 PM

Either that photo caption is incorrect, or China's Mars plans are more ambitious than anyone of us suspected....

Posted by: centsworth_II Aug 6 2009, 08:47 PM

Posted by: Paolo Aug 7 2009, 07:26 AM

I am told Yinghuo actually arrived in Moscow on 17 July but it has been reported only now

Posted by: Paolo Aug 8 2009, 10:09 AM

I have just received from a contact in China an interesting presentation about YH-1. Unfortunately he has asked me not to redistribute it...
just to summarize quickly:
- the 800x80000 km orbit will be quite suitable for exploring almost all areas of interaction between the solar wind and the planet including the ionospheric bow shock, magnetosheath, the pileup region and the tail and plasma sheet. Only the lower ionosphere will be out of reach, but it could still be sounded by mutual radiooccultations between Yinghuo and Fobos Grunt.
- five-instrument payload, including a plasma package, consisting of an electron analyzer and an ion analyzer and mass spectrometer, a radiooccultation sounder, a magnetometer and a camera with 200 m resolution at best to take pictures of Mars
- use of ESA and Russian deep space antennae
- 950 mm antenna, 12 W transmitter in two frequencies (8.4 and 7.17 GHz), data rate between 8 bps and 16 kbps
- use of VLBI for localization
- 8.8 hour eclipses in November 2010 (apoapsis within Mars' shadow cone)
- launch window for FG and YH-1 nominally running from 6 to 16 October

Posted by: Zvezdichko Aug 8 2009, 10:38 AM

Too bad they are so secretive. 200 m resolution doesn't impress me either.

Posted by: Paolo Aug 8 2009, 11:10 AM

The presentation I was sent was intended for internal use only and not for publication or distribution, so I was asked not to make it public.
As for the camera, I am getting the impression that the focus of the mission will actually be ionospheric studies. probably the camera is carried to produce "something visual" for PR.
Anyway, there are two cameras actually, with square 20 degree and 38 degree fields

Posted by: nprev Aug 8 2009, 05:19 PM

That's an encouraging paradigm for an emergent space agency; I hope that other organizations will take note (cough, ahem.)

And actually, given the anticipated highly elliptical orbit & consequent viewing geometry, there might be some spectacular pics indeed despite the low resolution.

Posted by: tedstryk Aug 9 2009, 02:12 AM

http://www.typicallyspanish.com/news/publish/article_22517.shtml

This is odd....I have seen this variations on this story in a few places, and they seem totally confident about flying the precursor mission on Phobos-Grunt in 2011...either the press is getting confused, there are poor communications, or they (the MetNet team) know something we don't.

Posted by: Hungry4info Aug 15 2009, 03:01 PM

Testing of landing radar for Phobos-Grunt (from Russianspaceweb)

On Aug 12, 2009, at the Flight Research Institute, LII, a piloted hot-air balloon lifted a test version of the DISD-FG landing radar for the Phobos-Grunt spacecraft. According to a posting on the LiveJournal.com web site, it was the first in a series of hot-air balloon flights, scheduled to reach as high as 3,000 meters. The program was conducted by Avgur airship center under a contract with the Vega enterprise, which developed the DISD-FG radar. Vega's representatives said that hot-air balloon flights had provided an ideal simulation of weightlessness during the space flight. Nikolai Galkin, Avgur's balloon pilot, was at the control during the ascent.

Posted by: Zvezdichko Aug 15 2009, 08:20 PM

Great info, Hungry4info!

Posted by: mps Aug 16 2009, 09:14 AM

Launch is scheduled for October (two months from now), and they started with landing radar tests? Correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't it sound a little bit late-ish?

Posted by: Hungry4info Aug 16 2009, 02:48 PM

Yeah that's what I was thinking, though I'm not familiar with how the Russians test their spacecraft.

Posted by: rlorenz Aug 17 2009, 12:30 AM

One of those things, I suppose. The Huygens radar altimeters were still being tested (balloon flight)
in December 2004......

Posted by: Zvezdichko Aug 21 2009, 01:10 PM

http://www.roscosmos.ru/NewsDoSele.asp?NEWSID=7155

Russia announces that all tests are due to be completed till September 20th. If they are not, the flight will be delayed to 2011. At this moment Georgy Polishtuk guesses that all work will be completed on time.

There are four unique features that characterize Phobos-Grunt. First, we have an unique propulsion system that may be used on trips to the Moon and Venus and other planets. This system is being tested only now. Second, we have the Chinese subsatellite. He's fully ready and is already integrated. Third - it's the landing on Phobos and work on the Natural satellite. Except the apparatus that will collect grunt we will have 19 (NINETEEN!) international scientific instruments. Mars is going to be explored remotely. Fourth - we have the sample return capsule which is due to launch from Phobos and return on Earth.

Phobos-Grunt is fully complete and now complex tests are to be carried.

As for the Lunar project, says Polishtuk, "Luna-Glob" probe is due to launch in 2011. Basic work has been completed. There are no serious problems here, either.

Posted by: Paolo Aug 22 2009, 08:27 AM

From MAKS 2009:



a model of Fobos-Grunt's launch configuration, with the YH-1 "birdcage"



and a model of YH-1 itself

Note that the configuration of F-G is the same shown in le Bourget in june, with the sample capsule mounted sideways instead of on top of the stack like a cherry on a pie...

Posted by: Paolo Aug 22 2009, 09:58 AM

Other pictures of Lavochkin's booth from the company's website



Fobos Grunt



Planetokhod

Posted by: tedstryk Aug 22 2009, 05:11 PM

Great Pictures...by the way, the MetNet ambiguity continues. This very recently published bit seems to indicate 2009 as a possibility. Strange...

http://meetingorganizer.copernicus.org/EGU2009/EGU2009-8237.pdf

Posted by: Paolo Aug 22 2009, 05:22 PM

The mass breakdown published in http://www.russianspaceweb.com/phobos_grunt.html includes the MML... we will know more in a few weeks, I hope

Posted by: tedstryk Aug 22 2009, 11:47 PM

It was then reported that MetNet had been fallen behind. Perhaps it caught up. I hope so.

Posted by: Zvezdichko Sep 2 2009, 01:17 PM

http://fg.iki.rssi.ru/current/phobos/

A friend of mine notified me that we finally have a countdown set up on IKI's website.

We just hope that all tests will be completed successfully till September 20th

Posted by: Ron Hobbs Sep 2 2009, 05:46 PM

If I did my math correctly, the countdown clock would put the launch on 15 Oct at 0700 GMT.

Posted by: Zvezdichko Sep 12 2009, 09:59 AM

http://oko-planet.su/science/sciencenews/17550-rossijskie-specialisty-delayut-vse-vozmozhnoe.html

http://www.ruvr.ru/main.php?lng=rus&q=125875&cid=437&p=18.08.2009&pn=1

Two links hint that Phobos-Grunt may launch in November, if necessary. I have no information about the current status of the tests, but Roscosmos already informed us that they should be completed very soon. If they are successful, they will proceed with launch.

Posted by: Zvezdichko Sep 14 2009, 02:51 PM

http://www.russianspaceweb.com/index.html

Anatoly Zak:

Posted by: tedstryk Sep 15 2009, 09:52 AM

The BBC has picked it up.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8254820.stm

Posted by: Zvezdichko Sep 15 2009, 03:54 PM

There's a very interesting thread on the novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru forum. The mood is VERY, very grim over there. Those who were obviously aware of the situation say: "I told you so, it was a theater". Others are very, very angry. I can understand these people, because they were promised a launch this year. But all I can say is: If you have an expensive, ambitious spacecraft that's not well tested - just don't launch it yet. I want to see the mission flying, but I also want to see the mission to succeed.

Posted by: Paolo Sep 16 2009, 05:32 PM

According to http://www.interfax.ru/society/news.asp?id=100737 Fobos-Grunt has been delayed to 2011

Posted by: Hungry4info Sep 17 2009, 03:27 AM

This mission may have just been saved from disaster.

Posted by: mps Sep 17 2009, 06:23 AM

http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5ikw3CuSiSD3XpmbaTlUeMumyXZdg

Posted by: Paolo Sep 17 2009, 06:01 PM

It will also be interesting to see how any delay will be welcomed in China.
Chinese sources have earlier hinted that they could launch HY-1 on their own (in 2011) if needed

Posted by: Zvezdichko Sep 17 2009, 08:02 PM

This is the right decision.

Keep in mind that Roscosmos still hasn't announced the delay. You will be informed as soon as it happens.

Posted by: Zvezdichko Sep 20 2009, 12:57 PM

For those who are curious - I'm checking the website of Roscosmos every day and still no word of official delay. Today is September 20th and i hope that the agency will inform us until the end of the day, as promised.

Posted by: Paolo Sep 21 2009, 05:38 PM

Here it is, F-G is officially delayed to 2011. Better this than losing another Russian planetary spacecraft!
http://www.rian.ru/science/20090921/185905786.html
http://www.infox.ru/science/universe/2009/09/21/fobos_grunt.phtml

Posted by: Zvezdichko Sep 21 2009, 06:42 PM

Yes, it's a better for the mission to be delayed.

Anyway, I find it a bit sad that we are missing a Mars window for a first time during the last 20 years. Well, not exactly 20 years, but... at least since Mars Observer.

The best thing that could happen will be a revival of Phoenix, but I don't have high hopes for this.

Posted by: Paolo Sep 21 2009, 06:58 PM

1994 was the last unused Mars launch window

Posted by: Zvezdichko Sep 22 2009, 10:45 AM

Despite the information from Lev Zelenyi, Roscosmos still hasn't announced an official delay.

According to Anatoly Zak, russianspaceweb.com editor, Russia will announce the official delay today. It's expected the delay to be based on the results of testings, but Zak has another opinion - the project started in 2007 and time to develop and test the spacecraft was insufficient.

Posted by: Paolo Sep 22 2009, 04:56 PM

Yes, what is interesting is that Zelenyi is reported saying that the problem was just time, and that the program was properly financed

Posted by: Zvezdichko Sep 22 2009, 08:36 PM

Roscosmos still hasn't announced an official delay, despite speculations that today was going to be the big day. This is what Zak says and this is also what I see on Roscosmos site.

Posted by: Liss Sep 29 2009, 12:40 PM

Roscosmos did confirmed the delay, sort of.
In today's Rossiyskaya Gazeta, head of Roscosmos Anatoliy Perminov spoke about it as of old news.
He told that the delay was requested by the Bureau of Space Souncil of the Russian Academy of Sciences.
He also spoke about three problems leading to delay:
(1) They do not know exactly what is Phobos soil like and which type of soil capture device would be the best.
(2) They do not have 100% comms coverage yet.
(3) More careful testing of component elements is needed.

http://www.rg.ru/2009/09/29/perminov.html

For those speaking Russian there is the related excerpt:

Posted by: climber Sep 29 2009, 03:19 PM

My Russian is good enough to understand 2011

Posted by: algorimancer Sep 29 2009, 06:02 PM

Mine might extend to "April 2011", but I wouldn't swear to it

Posted by: charborob Sep 29 2009, 06:13 PM

Google translation:

RG: What's wrong with the spacecraft Phobos-Grunt, which is to launch a satellite of Mars was planned in mid-October?
Perminov: Office of Space Sciences Board recommended to postpone the implementation of this scientific mission in October 2011.
RG: Why?
Perminov: In order to ensure greater reliability. Scientists expect to clarify the nature of the surface of Phobos. It is necessary to better design a device for collecting soil. If your soil is too hard, then the wrong way to the fence could nullify the results of such an expensive expedition. Furthermore, not yet achieved 100 percent reliability duplicated continuous communication with the staff on all phases of flight. Need more reliable and working out its constituent elements.
RG: And from what port it is connected to two years? If the machine was running now, by April 2011 he would have sat on Phobos ...
Perminov: In 2011 was called the best possible astronomical window for the flight to Mars and its moons. This will allow the "Phobos-Grunt" on the shortest path to reach the goal and back.

Posted by: mps Sep 29 2009, 06:18 PM

Actually, I think it is more something like that:
Rossiskaja Gazeta: Why exactly a two-year delay? If the spacecraft had launched now, it would arrive Phobos already in April 2011...

EDIT: charborob was quicker

Posted by: mps Oct 6 2009, 07:35 AM

http://www.spacenews.com/civil/industry-insiders-foresaw-delay-russia-phobos-grunt.html

Posted by: Paolo Oct 6 2009, 04:55 PM

Beside the fact that Medvezhiy Ozera is near Moscow, not near St Petersburg, anybody knows why Yevpatoria is no longer mentioned? is the Ukrainian deep space station abandoned?

Posted by: Eugen Oct 10 2009, 10:31 AM

Its still not abandoned. At last few year those facilities participate at such projects as:
- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cosmic_Call in 1999 and 2003
- http://lfvn.astronomer.ru/main/lfvn.htm from PulKon (ПулКон) in 2006-2007
But as I think our government is not interested in the space research. Often sound and appeals to the closure of the center of "economic reasons". Some information about the center http://grey-croco.livejournal.com/394467.html (but in russian)

Posted by: tolis Oct 29 2009, 08:32 PM

Hi All,

According to www.russiansdpaceweb.com/phobos_grunt_preflight.html#delay2009
the Phobos Grunt mission as intended to fly in 2009 is too heavy for the 2011 launch window.
It will have to lose 150 kg to allow the same Zenit LV to hurl it to Mars.

I would imagine this is not news to the Russian ballisticians in change of P-B trajectory analysis.
Launch window quality is usually known decades in advance of the actual flight projects
that utilise them.

In addition, the 2011 window does not allow a Mars orbit insertion directly into an equatorial
orbit (where Phobos is); therefore more fuel is needed to "zero out" the probe's orbital inclination.

It will be interesting to see how the problem is tackled. Some obvious options would be
either switching to a more powerful LV (a Proton is mentioned in the article) or losing
some of the payload.

What I'm not sure I understand is previous statements regarding the possibility of flying a MetNet Precursor mission
piggyback on P-G in 2011. Surely, one would not want to *add* payload to a vehicle that is already
overweight.

Perhaps someone can shed some light into all this.

Tolis.

Posted by: Hungry4info Oct 29 2009, 08:49 PM

I heard PhobosGrunt would have the MetLander (name?) added onto it now that it's targeted for the 2011 window. Apparently, this is unfeasible (and I think the mission is too complex for its own good anyway). Can they just drop the Chinese probe?