World record set with India's PSLV launch of 104 satellites!

[Mikesingh]

February 15, 2017

Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) made India proud today when it created a world record by launching 104 satellites in a single rocket. The satellites were launched from Sriharikota of Andhra Pradesh, and it has made India the first country to launch such a huge number of satellites together.

India, apart from outdoing its own previous achievements, has also moved ahead of Russia by a long margin. Russia had held the record earlier, for the most satellite launches in a single mission and the number was 37.

Russia had achieved that feat in 2014. This record is followed by the US space agency NASA, which has launched 29 satellites in a single mission. When ISRO had put into earth's orbit 10 satellites on the PSLV-C10 on June 2008, it had created a world record. But it was subsequently broken many times by Russian and American rockets.

ISRO had commenced the 28-hour countdown for the launch on Tuesday, which was the shortest for any Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle ever. The PSLV-37 is ISRO's workhorse and on its 39th mission, carried the 104 satellites. This single mission launch is India's second attempt and the first time it had launched 23 satellites in one go. That mission was launched in June 2016.

India's most powerful rocket the XL variant, which was used in the momentous Chandrayaan and during the Mars Orbiter Mission (MOM) has been used by ISRO in this launch too. In the launch, 100 satellites are foreign made, including some from the US, and rest of the 3 belong to India, which in itself is a big achievement.

Earlier, ISRO had reportedly planned to launch 83 satellites by January end. But later 20 more were added. PM Modi's pet South Asian satellite project is scheduled to be launched in March 2017 and it will be a part of GSAT-9, that will be launched in March 2017. Meanwhile, Modi congratulated to the space organisation for the successful launch of PSLV-C37 and CARTOSAT satellite together with 103 nanosatellites.

Way to go!! Next is Team Indus, India's first private company that is preparing a Moon Rover to land there by end of this year.



Cheers!

[The Seeker]

Now that is an interesting looking rover, actually looks streamlined and not a clapped together piece of junk.

Seeker

[micjer]

It does look good.  Wonder how big it is.

[Mikesingh]

It does look good.  Wonder how big it is.

Here are the details.....



To be carried by ISRO's PSLV, the spacecraft is a 3-axis stabilized, all-aluminium quadropod. The spacecraft will weigh 600kg at the time of takeoff. It houses a 460 Newton rocket engine, 16 control thrusters, fuel tank, oxidizer tank and guidance, and communication hardware. The company claims the spacecraft can survive temperature ranging from -230 degrees to 150 degrees Celsius.

This spacecraft will house the Team Indus rover.

Team Indus reveals that the spacecraft descent has been optimized for the landing to coincide with the lunar dawn at Mare Imbrium, which is a vast lava plain and the chosen landing site. The rover will send data including high-resolution images and videos of Earth.

The rover, ECA, is also all-aluminium, four wheel drive, and an all-terrain rover.

[Mikesingh]

Have you ever seen how satellites are ejected into space? Here's a video from the on-board cameras of the PSLV. You could call it 'selfies'! This is how it looked when 104 satellites were launched into orbit. 88 were from a private American company PlanetLabs. This was a package called 'Flock 3p'.

more here...https://twitter.com/PlanetLabs

And the video...

[micjer]

Personally I have concerns about their moon rover once I see the relative size of it.

I think they should have gone with 6 wheels and bigger wheels.  I think that unless the ground they land on is flat and smooth that their machine will get stuck in no time.

If they encounter rocks they may be able to back up, but if the surface is fluffy/dust, those wheels will spin out, imho

[The Seeker]

This is my idea of a rover 







Seeker

[Somamech]

Here are the details.....



To be carried by ISRO's PSLV, the spacecraft is a 3-axis stabilized, all-aluminium quadropod. The spacecraft will weigh 600kg at the time of takeoff. It houses a 460 Newton rocket engine, 16 control thrusters, fuel tank, oxidizer tank and guidance, and communication hardware. The company claims the spacecraft can survive temperature ranging from -230 degrees to 150 degrees Celsius.

This spacecraft will house the Team Indus rover.

Team Indus reveals that the spacecraft descent has been optimized for the landing to coincide with the lunar dawn at Mare Imbrium, which is a vast lava plain and the chosen landing site. The rover will send data including high-resolution images and videos of Earth.

The rover, ECA, is also all-aluminium, four wheel drive, and an all-terrain rover.

Finally... at least it doesn't look like a bag of Tibetan Cow Dung LOL