Category Archives: Space participation

Solar Science, Space participation, Space Systems

ISEE-3 Reboot Project – Help restart a sun-earth explorer

I’ve written about an effort to reconnect with the 36 year old International Sun-Earth Explorers (ISSE) spacecraft and direct it back to its original solar science mission:

Dennis Wingo (Skycorp) gives the background of the spacecraft and explains that since NASA has no funding to reconnect with it, a volunteer project is underway to do it : The International Sun-Earth Explorer (ISEE-3) Reboot Project, Bringing an Old Bird Back to the Earth, and Back to Life – Watts Up With That?

There is now a crowd-funding campaign to support the project:

The idea is a simple one: contact the ISEE-3, tell it to fire its engine, and get it into a stable Earth orbit. Once there, it can resume operations, collecting data for its original mission as well as potentially chasing more comets. NASA approves of the project in principle, but unfortunately, the agency doesn’t have the funds to support it financially, thanks to budget cuts and changing priorities. However, the project has brought together a large team of NASA scientists, coders, and engineers, and they have access to a radio telescope that can communicate with ISEE-3.

The project needs $125,000 to carry out its mission. This money will fund the very difficult task of figuring out how to use today’s technology to communicate with a spacecraft built over 35 years ago. The original hardware for ISEE-3’s communication capabilities no longer exists, so the team will have to recreate a virtual version from scratch,but ISEE-3 is in very good, and knowledgeable, hands: several members of the team are responsible for the Lunar Orbiter Image Recovery Project, which also depended on harnessing obsolete technology.

This video shows the orbital trajectory change needed:

More info at Space College: ISEE-3 Archives.

DIY space, Solar Sci-Fi, Space participation

Doug Turnbull interviews Mars One volunteers + Reads from new novel

Science fiction writer Doug Turnbull has a weekly podcast program in which he reports on space news highlights, interviews guests, and reads from his books. He recently has been interviewing Mars One expedition candidates and he also just started reading his latest novel, Zachary Dixon. Thus far it has a Robert Heinlein scenario and style to it that I like.

(BTW: Mars One just posted their latest newsletter: Mars One Begins Work on Simulation Mars Home for Crew.)

Here are the four most recent podcasts, which include the start of the Zachary Dixon novel:

* Episode XLVII – Mars One Second Round volunteer Anderson Wilder + beginning of the novel Zachary Dixon.

*Episode XLVIII – Mars One Second Round volunteer and data architect Dan Carey + 2nd installment of the novel Zachary Dixon.

* Episode XLIX – Part 2 of interview with Dan Carey +  3rd installment of  Zachary Dixon.

* Episode L – Mars One volunteer and US Army Chemical Defense officer, Heidi Beemer + 4th installment of Zachary Dixon.

 

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DIY space, Events, Space participation

Citizen Science and Space Exploration at MakerCon

A message from Citizens in space:

Citizen Science and Space Exploration at MakerCon

Redwood City, California – Citizens in Space, a project of the United States Rocket Academy, has joined the lineup for MakerCon, which takes place at the Oracle Conference Center in Redwood City on May 13-14, 2014.

MakerCon is a premiere event organized by Maker Media, publisher of Make magazine and producer of Maker Faire. MakerCon brings together the leaders at the forefront of the maker movement. The conference provides new insights into local and global manufacturing, design, marketing and distribution, and diverse funding options to help makers bring their products to market.

Edward Wright, founder of the United States Rocket Academy and program manager for Citizens in Space, will speak on “Citizen Science and Citizen Space Exploration.” Citizens in Space has acquired a contract for 10 flights on the Lynx spacecraft, which is currently under construction by XCOR Aerospace in Mojave, California. Wright will discuss opportunities for makers to fly experiments through Citizens in Space and opportunities for citizen astronauts to fly as payload operators.

“New vehicles like the XCOR Lynx will dramatically reduce the cost of access to space,” Wright said. “and low-cost access will revolutionize the way people use space. Everyone in the professional maker community needs to think about how space fits into their business plans.”

Other featured speakers at MakerCon include Carl Bass, CEO of Autodesk; Massimo Banzi, co-founder of Arduino; Brook Drumm, co-founder and CEO at Printrbot; Eric Klein, partner at Lemnos Labs; Peter Hirshberg, CEO of The Re:imagine Group; Connie Hu, CEO of ArcBotics; Kevin Kelly, founding executive editor of Wired and founder of Cool Tools; Jason Kessler, Asteroid Grand Challenge Program Executive at NASA; Eric Pan, founder and CEO of Seeed Studios; Jose Gomez-Marquez, principal medical device designer at MIT’s Little Devices Lab; Brian David Johnson, futurist at Intel; Mickey McManus, CEO of MAYA Design; Edward Screven, chief corporate architect at Oracle; Yancey Strickler, co-founder and CEO of Kickstarter; and Leon Wong, director of market strategy at Xerox PARC.

MakerCon is presented by Intel and hosted by Oracle Corporation.

More information, including a complete list of speakers, is available at www.makercon.com. Registration is available at www.makercon.com/attend. Early-bird registration rates expire on April 27.

Additional information about Citizens in Space can be found at www.citizensinspace.org.

Education, Near Space, Space participation

Kickstarter for 2000 student PongSats needs your help

The Kickstarter to send 2000 Student Projects to the Edge of Space (see earlier post) is close but needs a push in the next week to reach their target before the time runs out.  Help JP Aerospace with their campaign to fly 2000 student made Pongsats to Near Space:

DIY space, Rockets, Space participation

Copenhagen Suborbitals: Hybrid HATV engine test webcast, Mon. Apr.21st

An announcement from Copenhagen Suborbitals:

Monday April 21st we test our SUPER HATV experimental rocket engine.

Monday April 21st 15.00PM CEST [9:00 am EDT] we are testing a new engine of the HATV type. We call this subtype “Super HATV”, and we invite you to watch the test live here on our website. The livestream will start approximately one hour before the engine fires. If the engine test is sucessful we will attempt to reload and fire it a second time. There will be no commentary available but you will be able to hear our internal radio communication.

This test is the first in a series of minor test planned this summer to investigate the behaviour of hypergolic hydrogen perioxide rocket engines. This engine type can be very useful in the future as control thrusters or main booster for smaller experimeltal rockets.

You can watch the test LIVE on our website.

Please note that changes in schedule can occur due to weather conditions or technical problems. The live stream will start at 14:00 CEST [8:00 am EDT] and any major delays will be announced on the website.