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clrmoney
clrmoney
10/23/2017 12:52:21 PM
User Rank
Platinum
Next Generation Satellites
I thought there were many satellites in space so with the Eutelsat satellite is great knowing what they have to offer for us going into the future.

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mhhf1ve
mhhf1ve
10/23/2017 1:36:36 PM
User Rank
Platinum
Re: Next Generation Satellites
I have to wonder if the next generation of satellites will be far more disposable -- since SpaceX and Blue Origin are aiming to reduce the costs of launching them significantly. Future nano-sats will have to be de-orbited regularly so they don't build up space junk up there. There will always be a role for "big satellites" -- but the smaller ones in LEO are going to start taking over soon, I think.

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JohnBarnes
JohnBarnes
10/23/2017 2:35:49 PM
User Rank
Platinum
Re: Next Generation Satellites
mhhf1ve,

I absolutely concur.  And the specific features that Quantum has moved into software control are exactly the ones that are going to be needed for cheap, disposable LEO belt satellites (though I would bet those satellites don't stay "nano" for terribly long; a good-sized antenna and power array is going to be too useful to pass up, and even in the "narrow" confines of LEO, space is big).

Given the intrinsic problems of geostationary orbit (huge unavoidable latency, large energy costs for both placement and disposal, and being on the wrong side of the Van Allen belts for any kind of maintenance or modification mission), the future is probably in LEO -- and the physics of LEO (short orbital period, mainly, but also much bigger stationkeeping problems) dictate  a need for exactly the kind of software-driven flexibility that is developing in Quantum.

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mpouraryan
mpouraryan
10/23/2017 3:12:20 PM
User Rank
Platinum
Re: Next Generation Satellites
It seems to me that someone has to think about the existing "junk" that is around us right now--as we continue to go to "commodize" space travel.    

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afwriter
afwriter
10/23/2017 5:41:06 PM
User Rank
Platinum
Re: Next Generation Satellites
Maybe cleaning up the space junk will end up being the next billion dollar business. Hopefully, we learn our lesson about polluting space faster than we did with the oceans. 

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JohnBarnes
JohnBarnes
10/23/2017 7:42:15 PM
User Rank
Platinum
Re: Next Generation Satellites
Space junk is strictly and only the collision hazard near the Earth, the only part of space that is crowded currently (and it will be a long time before we put anything like that much junk around any other planet).  There are potentially a lot of ways to bring it down; my personal favorite is to have robot "frogs" use it as a propellant -- robot intercepts piece of junk, shoves off from it in the direction of another piece of junk, but can only make jumps that push the junk into a more eccentric orbit with a lower perigee. Sort of like frogs hopping from lilypad to lilypad.  The frogs can be solar powered and need not carry much onboard propellant (maybe just some captured very small junk chunks).  Over time, with enough jumps, the space junk is in orbits that deteriorate fast (high eccentricity means more energy loss through tidal effects, low perigee means it passes through the thin wisp of the upper atmosphere).  Sooner or later, after enough frogs have used it, it comes in as a meteor, burns up, and is gone.

Of course the databases needed to support that system would be huge -- perhaps as big as one tenth of Walmart's, though one-twentieth is more likely. Build the frogs and we can start it up today ... and with the multiple payload systems coming into wider use, we can just load frogs into spare payload spaces.

All that's needed is the will to pay for it.

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elizabethv
elizabethv
10/26/2017 8:19:10 AM
User Rank
Platinum
Re: Next Generation Satellites
@mpouraryan - That's a pretty good point, about cleaning up the existing space junk. But I think before it becomes something someone cares about enough to work on taking care of the situation, it would have to be a problem a fair number of people care enough about collectively to make known.  Kind of like the problem we have with all these cheap clothes filling up land-fills. We humans tend to be excessively skilled at making trash.

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mpouraryan
mpouraryan
10/26/2017 10:48:12 AM
User Rank
Platinum
Re: Next Generation Satellites
Let's hope for the sake of Mother Earth someone will think about it sooner than later.

 

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elizabethv
elizabethv
10/31/2017 5:39:30 AM
User Rank
Platinum
Re: Next Generation Satellites
Agreed. But I just watched a video about floating trash near Honduras that follows the currents. And while I have seen a trash collector thing that floats around the ocean sucking up the trash and filtering out the water, in truly thinking about the situaiton I'm not genuinely sure that this is truly a solution. So these things pick up the trash, and then they go back into a landfill, and find their way back to the ocean? 

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mpouraryan
mpouraryan
10/31/2017 3:30:15 PM
User Rank
Platinum
Re: Next Generation Satellites
To Paraphrase Nitezsche, To learn to run, once has to first stand and walk--what is critical to note is that doing nothing cannot simply be an option.  It cannot.

 

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dlr5288
dlr5288
10/31/2017 1:40:23 PM
User Rank
Platinum
Re: Next Generation Satellites
True. I think there definitely needs to be something done about all the space that’s being filled up. It’s important to keep good exhausting files that will be needed for the future, but other than that things need to go.

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srufolo1
srufolo1
10/24/2017 10:32:54 AM
User Rank
Platinum
Next-Gen Satellites
It is the first "software defined" satellite, and because functions are defined in software, it has so much flexibility

Eutelsat's approach is proactive and ingenious because it makes control of the satellite easier. Customers demand to be in control these days, and a software-defined satellite is just the ticket.

 

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JohnBarnes
JohnBarnes
10/25/2017 2:59:26 PM
User Rank
Platinum
Re: Next-Gen Satellites
srufolo1,

Repurposing makes software-driven functions even more valuable.  Currently there are a fairly surprising number of satellites that are probably still functional but were sent dormant a long time ago because key clients or subcontractors went out of business or chopped the budget or changed priorities (or in the case of governments decided not to go through with the original project).   For large parts of its long (20+ year) existence, much of the first generation Iridium network was unused or underused, and now that the new Iridiums are going up, there's not much to do with the old ones except throw them away -- and yet they're perfectly functional.  Imagine what a bread truck would cost if you had to buy one that could only haul one shape and size of loaf between one specific bakery and one specific store -- now imagine trying to get a buyer for it when it's useless for yard services, small hauling companies, conversion to a food truck, etc. etc. etc. --  and you have what has been the classic problem for comsats. Software driven flexibility is definitely the way to go.

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