Titan + Enceladus = Goose bumps, Tomorrow is just ahead! Options

[ustrax]

I thought about a new thread since there are possibilities of an incredible future mission.

The idea is to know what would people like to see on a mission like that, nature of probes, instruments, experiments...you name it!

[Juramike]

Sure wish we could scoop up some of this Titan goop. But VERY GINGERLY.

Craig

Maybe a sample return mission from Titan is reasonably doable after all.

Getting a package to Titan's surface has been done (Huygens landed and survived)
Getting a package off Titan's surface may be a bit trickier, but Titan has the bonus of liquid fuel in the form of Methan/ethane. We would only need to supply the oxidizer (oxygen).

I picture an atmospheric balloon with multiple sample containers. It sets down, scoops stuff into a container. Proceeds to the next location, scoops more in, etc.. It finally drifts over to a methane/ethane lake, fills up the propellant tanks for the escape package. Floats up to maximum altitude and the escape package (which has the oxygen tank) ignites, separates and goes back to Earth on a long slow trajectory.

Even after the escape package separates, the balloon could still maintain a smaller instrument package for surface imaging, MS analysis, and other meteorological analysis for a long duration stay in the Titan atmosphere.


Even a small amount of non-volatile material from the Titanian surface delivered to Earth would speak infitine volumes about Titan surface chemistry and the potential for life.

-Mike

[mchan]

...Titan has the bonus of liquid fuel in the form of Methan/ethane. We would only need to supply the oxidizer (oxygen).

I picture an atmospheric balloon with multiple sample containers. It sets down, scoops stuff into a container. Proceeds to the next location, scoops more in, etc.. It finally drifts over to a methane/ethane lake, fills up the propellant tanks for the escape package.

At this point we don't know what the exact constituents of the "lakes" are or even 100% certain that the "lakes" contain liquid. Good knowledge of this from precursor missions would be required before designing a sample return mission around the use of in-situ fuel. E.g., can the fuel be used as-is or would some separation / refining be required? One might be able to burn some crude oil pumped directly from the ground in an automobile engine, but refined gasoline or diesel would be better.

Regarding the dual aerobrake, the Titan aerobrake is not required to be on the 1st outbound leg after the Saturn aerobrake. Recall Cassini's trajectory and Huygen's deploy after the SOI burn. The delayed Huygens deploy was because of the link receiver problem, but the point is that there is flexibility to schedule / delay critical orbit maneuvers to make more efficient use of trajectory correction fuel.