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

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

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

The presentation I was sent was intended for internal use only and not for publication or distribution, so I was asked not to make it public.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

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.

http://www.typicallyspanish.com/news/publi...cle_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.

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.

Great info, Hungry4info!

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?

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

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

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.

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...

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



Fobos Grunt



Planetokhod

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/EGU...GU2009-8237.pdf