New Horizons Arrives At Ksc |
New Horizons Arrives At Ksc |
Sep 26 2005, 09:56 PM
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Member Group: Members Posts: 134 Joined: 13-March 05 Member No.: 191 |
NASA Press Release
APL press release Space.com Article Coming up... October: communications checks November: hydrazine loading and Atlas V countdown rehearsal December: integration with Atlas V January: LAUNCH! No pictures on the KSC webcams yet. But still pictures here. Is that the flight RTG attached to the spacecraft? Or just a dummy? |
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Sep 28 2005, 04:06 PM
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Member Group: Members Posts: 531 Joined: 24-August 05 Member No.: 471 |
But how many RTGs are actually on board?
Earlier ... --- Half of the plutonium for New Horizons was on hand when DoE stopped work at the nuclear weapons plant in July 2004. A total of 36 of the 72 fuel units ordered had been left over from a spare RTG built earlier for NASA's Galileo and Cassini missions. When the lab shut down, it had 18 more units in the works. The 2006 launch will go ahead with as few as 61 fuel units. Los Alamos scientists could convert plutonium bought from Russia into pellets packaged in hockey-puck-sized containers. Then the Argonne National Laboratory at Idaho Falls would put those RTG containers into the RTG. An RTG with a full load of 72 fuel units can deliver 200 watts of electricity. With only half of its fuel, 36 fuel units, it could deliver about 100 watts. With a minimum of 61 fuel units, the RTG could provide 170 watts of electrical power. The electricity would be used to power seven science instruments and spacecraft systems aboard New Horizons. --- -------------------- - blue_scape / Nico -
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Sep 28 2005, 05:50 PM
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#3
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Dublin Correspondent Group: Admin Posts: 1799 Joined: 28-March 05 From: Celbridge, Ireland Member No.: 220 |
QUOTE (SigurRosFan @ Sep 28 2005, 05:06 PM) But how many RTGs are actually on board? ..... An RTG with a full load of 72 fuel units can deliver 200 watts of electricity. With only half of its fuel, 36 fuel units, it could deliver about 100 watts. With a minimum of 61 fuel units, the RTG could provide 170 watts of electrical power. The electricity would be used to power seven science instruments and spacecraft systems aboard New Horizons. --- Not sure but Alan Stern's message here on Feb 19th says: QUOTE The RTG and the necessary fuel are both in good shape. Previous problems resolved. All needed fuel is now ready. We expect 190 W or a tad more at Pluto in mid-2015. The s/c requires ~165W, so there is a healthy margin. The launch approval process has begun, and will take the remainder of the year to complete. These RTG's degrade at around 0.79% per annum so 190W at Pluto (mid 2015) works back to around 205W now and should still be >165Watts in 2031. Alan commented later: QUOTE This depends on when we launch in the 2006 window or the backup 2007 window because the exit velocity varies with launch date. The basic answer is that predicts show that we have sufficient power to run out to 2025, which corresponds to ~50-60 AU if all goes well. So basically, no worries, loadsa juice. Let's just all do our bit to make sure that we don't let woowoo panic merchants hamper the launch. Actually I've just been re-reading the whole thred - it's well worth it. |
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Sep 28 2005, 07:29 PM
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Member Group: Members Posts: 531 Joined: 24-August 05 Member No.: 471 |
QUOTE (helvick @ Sep 28 2005, 07:50 PM) 0.79%? I thought the spacecrafts RTG generally loses 3 to 5 watts of power-generating capacity a year. What is correct? -------------------- - blue_scape / Nico -
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