India ISRO Mars Orbiter Mission (mission.thread)


Recommended Posts

GO ISRO!!

http://www.spacenews.com/article/launch-report/37804launch-of-indian-mars-probe-rescheduled-for-nov-5

BANGALORE, India ? India?s 4.5 billion rupee ($73.5 million) mission to Mars, the nation?s first true interplanetary probe, is now slated to lift off Nov. 5 at 2:36 local time from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Sriharikota, the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) announced Oct. 22.

The launch of the 1,350-kilogram Mars Orbiter Mission aboard an enhanced version of ISRO?s Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle had been scheduled for Oct. 28, but was delayed because ships equipped to track the spacecraft after its separation from the rocket could not take up their designated positions in the south Pacific Ocean in time due to bad weather. The spacecraft, dubbed Mangalyan, has been mated with the launcher and the heat shield has been closed, ISRO said.

If everything goes according to plan, Mangalyan will leave Earth orbit in November and cruise in deep space for 10 months using an onboard propulsion system before entering into a 372-kilometer by 80,000-kilometer elliptical orbit around Mars. ISRO says the primary objectives of the orbiter are to demonstrate India?s technological capability, look for signs of life and study the planet?s atmospheric composition.

MOM_ISRO4X3.jpg

indian_mars_missio_1605706g.jpg

  • Like 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Dunno, but the PSLV only costs about $20-30m, which is very cheap itself and getting India quite a few launch orders.

The design of the first stage is a solid fueled core with up to 6 strap-on boosters. The second stage is liquid, the third stage is another solid and the fourth stage is another liquid. A bit of a Frankenrocket, but whatthehell - it works.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

http://spaceflightnow.com/pslv/c25/131024update/

Indian Mars orbiter attached to launch vehicle

Workers have placed India's first Mars orbiter on top of a Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle for liftoff Nov. 5, the Indian Space Research Organization announced this week.

The Mars Orbiter Mission spacecraft is enclosed inside the Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle fairing. Credit: ISRO

The 2,976-pound spacecraft is set to blast off at 0906 GMT (4:06 a.m. EST) from the Satish Dhawan Space Center on Sriharikota Island, a facility on India's east coast about 50 miles north of Chennai.

Technicians lifted the Indian-built orbiter on top of the four-stage PSLV inside the rocket's mobile service structure at the space center's First Launch Pad. The ground team installed the rocket's aerodynamic shroud, emblazoned with the Indian flag and mission logos, around the spacecraft this week to finish assembly of the 144-foot-tall launcher.

The Mars Orbiter Mission will use the most powerful version of India's workhorse rocket named the PSLV XL, which features beefed-up solid rocket boosters. The PSLV XL will boost the spacecraft into an elliptical orbit around Earth, then the probe will use its own propulsion system to propel itself out of Earth orbit and on a trajectory to Mars.

The final Earth departure burn is scheduled for around Nov. 30, according to ISRO.

ISRO officials delayed the launch from Oct. 28 because bad weather in the Pacific Ocean delayed the arrival of communications ships in Fiji. The vessels will track the mission's progress after launch.

India has until Nov. 19 to launch the mission or else abandon the flight until early 2016. The launch window depends on the proper alignment of Earth and Mars in the solar system to permit the interplanetary journey.

The $73 million project is India's first Mars mission. The spacecraft is scheduled to arrive in orbit around the red planet in September 2014.

The Indian spacecraft will enter an orbit ranging in altitude from 234 miles to nearly 50,000 miles above Mars, completing a lap around the planet every 3.2 days.

The Mars Orbiter Mission will demonstrate deep space navigation and communications, interplanetary travel, spacecraft autonomy, and the complex make-or-break rocket burn to place the spacecraft in orbit around Mars.

Only the United States, Russia and the European Space Agency have successfully dispatched robots to Mars before. The Indian Space Research Organization hopes to be the fourth space agency to accomplish the feat.

The Indian orbiter carries a small camera to return medium-resolution color imagery of the Martian terrain, a thermal infrared spectrometer to measure the chemical composition of the surface, and instruments to assess the Mars atmosphere, including a methane detector.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 weeks later...

http://www.marsdaily.com/m/reports/India_reaches_for_Mars_on_prestige_space_mission_999.html

India began a countdown Sunday to the launch of its most ambitious and risky space mission to date, sending a probe to Mars which was conceived in just 15 months on a tiny budget.

After a recent Chinese attempt flopped, India is seeking to make a statement of its technological prowess by becoming the first Asian power to reach the Red Planet more than 200 million kilometres (124 million miles) away.

An unmanned probe, weighing 1.35 tonnes and about the size of a large refrigerator, will leave earth strapped to an Indian rocket which is set to blast off from the south-east coast on Tuesday afternoon.

Wrapped in a golden film, the orbiter will carry advanced sensors to measure the Martian atmosphere, hoping to detect traces of methane which could help prove the existence of some sort of primitive life form.

"Any interplanetary probe is complex. As we can see for Mars, there were 51 missions so far around the world and there were 21 successful missions," chairman of the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), K. Radhakrishnan, told AFP last Thursday.

Undeterred by the failure rates, he laughed off any suggestion of last-minute nerves, saying: "If it is a failure, then learn. Failure is a stepping stone for success."

Success would be a source of national pride for Indians, whose 2008 unmanned mission to the moon helped prove the existence of water in another leap forward, 39 years after Neil Armstrong set foot there.

It would also bolster the reputation of India, the land of the world's cheapest car, as a leader in low-cost innovation. The project was announced in August 2012 with a budget of only 4.5 billion rupees ($73 million).

Lacking a rocket large enough to fire the satellite directly out of earth's atmosphere, ISRO has also had to rely on another famed Indian specialism of "Jugaad" -- confecting a cheap work-around solution.

Instead of flying directly, the 350-tonne rocket will orbit earth for nearly a month, building up the necessary velocity to break free from the earth's gravitational pull.

"Don't underestimate it because it is a low-cost mission that is being done for the first time," Indian science journalist Pallava Bagla, author of the book "Destination Moon", told AFP.

"Yes, there is Jugaad in it, there is innovation in it... and everyone wants to do low-cost missions nowadays."

NASA is under budget pressure and has faced cuts to proposed Mars missions in 2016 and 2018 despite having an overall objective, set by US President Barack Obama, of sending an astronaut there by 2030.

The United States is the only nation that has successfully sent robotic explorers to land on Mars, the most recent being Curiosity, a nearly one-tonne vehicle which touched down in August 2012.

One of its discoveries appeared to undercut the purpose of the Indian mission after a study published in September revealed Curiosity detected only trace elements of methane in the Mars atmosphere.

NASA will help ISRO with ground monitoring from three deep-space facilities after the launch at 02:38pm (0938 GMT) on Tuesday. The American space agency will send its own probe, Maven, 13 days later.

The official countdown for blastoff of the Indian orbiter, nicknamed "Mangalyaan" in local media, began at 06:08am on Sunday, which is the Hindu festival of lights known as Diwali.

Only the US, Russia and the European Union have succeeded in reaching Mars before. China failed in 2011 with its probe aboard a Russian rocket and Japan's effort floundered in 2003.

Radhakrishnan denies that India is competing with China despite speculation that India accelerated its Mars mission to prove a point against its militarily and economically superior Asian rival.

He also defends ISRO and its 16,000-strong workforce against suggestions that New Delhi should not be spending on space when more than a third of all children are malnourished and half of Indians have no toilets.

"Space is one area right from the beginning that has been contributing to the development process of the country," he said, pointing to better weather forecasting for farmers and satellite communication networks.

Upendra Choudhury, an associate professor at Aligarh Muslim University who is an expert on India's ballistic missile programme, says the spending has also boosted national security.

"India's achievements in space technology are contributing to its missile technology, including the Agni-V," he told AFP.

The Agni-V, capable of reaching Beijing and eastern Europe, was test fired for the first time in April 2012 and catapulted India into a small group of countries with such long-distance missile technology.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Because of an almost forgotten engineering principle: KISS (KEEP IT SIMPLE STUPID)

The Indians are masters of the art.

I have more shockers for many westerners: India is building their own fleet of Boomers, AKA nuclear powered ballistic missile submarines. The lead boat, the INS Arihant, is in sea trials right now: 112m long displacing 6,000 metric tonnes. They are also fielding a domestically made anti-ballistic missile (ABM) system.

Same design philosophies.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

^^ the spiral-out of Earth orbit and spiral-in to Mars orbit is very similar to a manned mission profile if it used an ion or plasma drive. The main difference is this uses several chemocal rocket burns to slingshot to escape velocity while ion/plasma would do a constant burn to accelerate. Good practice.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

http://m.space.com/23464-india-launches-mars-orbiter-mission.html

India's first-ever mission to Mars launched into space today (Nov. 5), beginning the country's first interplanetary mission to explore the solar system.

With a thunderous roar, India's Mars Orbiter Mission rocketed into space at 4:08 a.m. EST (0908 GMT) from the Indian Space Research Organisation's Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Sriharikota, where the local time will be 2:38 p.m. in the afternoon. An ISRO Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle launched the probe on its 300-day trek into orbit around the Red Planet.

"The journey has only just begun," said ISRO Chairman K. Radhakrishnan after the successful launch.

Less than an hour after liftoff, Radhakrishnan reported that India's Mars probe successfully entered a staging orbit around Earth. Mars Orbiter Mission director Kunhi Krishnan describing the launch as a start to a "grand and glorious" mission.

If all goes well, India's first Mars orbiter ? called Mangalyaan (Hindi for "Mars Craft") ? will arrive at the Red Planet on Sept. 24, 2014, making India the fourth country to successfully deliver a spacecraft to Mars. The $73.5 million Mangalyaan spacecraft weighs 2,980 pounds (1,350 kilograms). Through the course of several orbits, the spacecraft will perform a series of maneuvers to place it on a path to Mars.

>

  • Like 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

:) this is a good day for ISRO

He also defends ISRO and its 16,000-strong workforce against suggestions that New Delhi should not be spending on space when more than a third of all children are malnourished and half of Indians have no toilets.

Not this crap again :/
Link to comment
Share on other sites

ISRO confirms both primary and secondary deployment of the solar panels.

Orbit:

Target: 250 x 23500 km x 19.2?

Observed: 246.9 x 23566.69 km x 19.2?

Argument of perigee :

Target: 282.550?

Observed: 282.785?

Well done!!

  • Like 3
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 3 weeks later...

Pics from the MOM Mars Colour Camera. The area covered includes Egypt, the Horn of Africa, the Middle East, Pakistan, part of China, Nepal and India from ~70,000km / 43,500mi

post-774-0-58870000-1384983598.jpg

Link to comment
Share on other sites

MOM Mars injection is at about 00:36 December 1st. If that's Indian time it should be 18:48 hours UTC on November 30th. Delta-V is 648 m/s for a 1,351 second engine burn.

This is the first time that a differential radiometer based on Fabry-Perot Etalon filters will be used for remote sensing of a planetary atmosphere. Such a complex payload was realized in one-and-a-half years and the credit goes to the payload team who worked day and night under the leadership of associate project director S S Sarkar, and deputy project director A R Srinivasan....

MSM = Methane Sensors for Mars

At the apogee of the orbit, satellite altitude is about 80,000 km while the ground track velocity is less than 20m per sec. This means the MSM will look on the same ground scene for longer periods. By integrating the MSM signal for longer time intervals it is possible to increase the signal-to-noise performance of the sensor. So, even though the expected methane concentration in the Martian atmosphere is extremely low, we may detect it. Retrieval of methane concentration from MSM data is a challenge as it requires correcting the data for absorption by carbon dioxide gas which constitutes about 95% of the Martian atmosphere....

Link to comment
Share on other sites

and....

Of the orbiter?s five payloads, three had been tested from November 19. They are the MCC, the Martian Exospheric Neutron Composition Analyser to look at the exosphere of Mars and the Thermal Infrared Imaging System (TIIS) to study the Red Planet?s geological activity. ?We switched on these three and their health is normal. They are basically working,

>

Mars spacecraft had successfully completed the calibration of the spacecraft?s high-gain and medium-gain antenna. All the spacecraft systems are working normally. We are preparing for the orbiter?s trans-Mars insertion on December 1

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On the way....

http://m.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-25163113

India's mission to Mars has embarked on its 300-day journey to the Red Planet.

Early on Sunday the spacecraft fired its main engine for more than 20 minutes, giving it the correct velocity to leave Earth's orbit.

It will now cruise for 680m km (422m miles), setting up an encounter with its target on 24 September 2014.

The Mars Orbiter Mission (MOM), also known as Mangalyaan, is designed to demonstrate the technological capability to reach Mars orbit.

But the $72m (?45m) probe will also carry out experiments, including a search for methane gas in the planet's atmosphere.

MOM tweeted: "Earth orbiting phase of the #Mangalyaan ended and now is on a course to encounter Mars after a journey of about 10 months around the Sun."

The head of the Indian Space Research Organisation (Isro) K Radhakrishnan said the operation to leave orbit had passed off well.

Since launch on 5 November, the craft has progressively raised its orbit around Earth with a series of engine burns.

The manoeuvres were all successful apart from the fourth, carried out on 11 November, during which a problem with the liquid fuel thruster caused the MOM to fall short of the mark.

But Isro has made plans for the eventuality that changes need to be made to the 1,350kg spacecraft's course.

corrections; first one will be around December 11 - plus or minus a couple of days depending on the deviation," the NDTV news channel reported V Koteswara Rao, Isro's scientific secretary, as saying.

On Earth, the majority of atmospheric methane (CH4) is produced by living organisms. The gas has previously been detected in Mars's atmosphere by orbiting spacecraft and by telescopes on Earth.

But Nasa's rover Curiosity recently failed to find the gas in its atmospheric measurements.

If the MOM can detect methane, one possible source could be Martian microbes, perhaps living deep beneath the surface. But CH4 can also be produced by geological processes, including volcanism.

India's PSLV rocket - the second choice for the mission after a beefier launcher failed - was not powerful enough to send the MOM on a direct flight to Mars.

So engineers opted for a method of travel called a Hohmann Transfer Orbit to propel the spacecraft from Earth to Mars with the least amount of fuel possible.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Same. What they are doing is very impressive. 

What is even cooler is when they were using the camera to take the full res images to verify the height of the craft, they also happen to capture the hurricane image right next to India which allowed them to use the early warning system.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

It's not so much the lack of mass but the lack of a sizeable geomagnetic field or active volcanism. Absent them the solar wind keeps knocking off the top of the atmosphere a bit at a time without a way to replenish it.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

This topic is now closed to further replies.
  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.