Indian Space Program Discussion

Jamal K. Malik · Post by **Jamal K. Malik** » 04 Jul 2009 20:18

Chandrayaan-II to be launched by 2013

KrishG · Post by **KrishG** » 04 Jul 2009 22:37

Jamal K. Malik wrote:Chandrayaan-II to be launched by 2013

Thought this was coming! Recently, ISRO changed the Chandrayaan-2 launch vehicle from GSLV-Mk 2 to the yet untested Mark-3. Although there might have been other issues, this seems to be a very important one. It takes 3 successful flights + extra to conclude that the vehicle has no hitches. The first flight of Mk-3 will take place somewhere in 2011 and I think after official commission and some more flights it will be ready to launch Chandrayaan-2. This cold mean that the launch date is probably 2013.

Katare · Post by **Katare** » 04 Jul 2009 23:12

Krish are you sure about GSLV?

KrishG · Post by **KrishG** » 04 Jul 2009 23:47

Katare wrote:Krish are you sure about GSLV?

http://www.timesnow.tv/India-plans-to-d ... 320934.cms

ISRO and Russia's federal space agency Roskosmos are currently working on the joint Chandrayan-2 project for which the Russian side would provide a lunar landing craft to put a Moon-rover for the lunar research. Under the agreement signed in 2007, the Chandrayan-2 lunar mission is planned in 2011-2012 for which ISRO is developing new powerful GSLV-Mark-III space launch vehicle, Nair said.

http://www.popmech.ru/article/5593-novo ... monavtiki/

Babelfish translation

The Indian organization of space studies (ISRO) prepared together with the Russian scientists the program of the lunar mission Of chandrayaan-2. This there will be the second Indian mission to the Moon, which provides for the injection of automatic spacecraft into low lunar orbit with the subsequent department and the descent of moon rover. And moon rover, and landing module will construct Russian side. For the sending of apparatus into space India creates the new carrier rocket - GSLV-Mark OF THE III, which for the first time will be neglected in 2010-11 yr.

Jamal K. Malik · Post by **Jamal K. Malik** » 05 Jul 2009 15:59

Isro looking at 25 per cent revenue growth

“The Mars mission could be delayed as there aren’t enough scientific ideas coming through”Nair said.

Shankar · Post by **Shankar** » 05 Jul 2009 17:07

Krish are you sure about GSLV?

MK 3 may not be ready most likely will not be ready by 2011 so if GSLV is used it will be Vanila variety mk 2 with indian cryo engine

suryag · Post by **suryag** » 05 Jul 2009 23:01

Guys when are we supposed to fly our Cryogenic engine on gslv-mk2? It was supposed to be this year. GLSV-mk3 should also take into account the feedback from this event.

Gerard · Post by **Gerard** » 06 Jul 2009 00:48

Thursday, July 17, 2008
http://pib.nic.in/release/release.asp?relid=40458

Geo-synchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle (GSLV) Project Operational Flights- F11 to F16 The Union Cabinet today gave its approval for funding of six GSLV operational flights (F11 to F16) at a total estimated cost of Rs. 1280.96 crores with a Foreign Exchange component of Rs. 272.90 crores.

With the realization of six GSLV Operational flights ( 9F11 to F16 ) end-to-end capability to launch communication satellites will be available during the Eleventh Five Year Plan.
The six flights (GSLV F11 –16) are expected to be realized during the time-frame 2010-1012.
...The next mission aims at the launch of GSLV-D3 during early 2008, which will be the maiden flight of GSLV with indigenous Cryogenic Upper Stage (CUS) and will carry the GSAT-4 satellite into GTO.

Come Aug, ISRO to launch GSAT-4

SSridhar · Post by **SSridhar** » 06 Jul 2009 08:51

suryag wrote:Guys when are we supposed to fly our Cryogenic engine on gslv-mk2? It was supposed to be this year. GLSV-mk3 should also take into account the feedback from this event.

That should be any time now.

Shankar · Post by **Shankar** » 06 Jul 2009 12:49

may be the next gslv launch - in few months

ashish raval · Post by **ashish raval** » 09 Jul 2009 11:44

Some news on Chandrayan-II

http://www.indianexpress.com/news/chand ... es/485904/

Landing is the biggest business in space. If one can land, the battle is won. The only thing rest of the world dont know is how to land (except russians who landed luna).
one idea already used is 1) providing auxillary small rockets/engine which fires as landing craft descends to a certain height and help craft reduce the speed of descent to a manageable level.
To manage to land quarter/half tonnne is very chanllenging task.

SSridhar · Post by **SSridhar** » 12 Jul 2009 12:01

ISRO making space suits

KrishG · Post by **KrishG** » 12 Jul 2009 13:44

ashish raval wrote:Some news on Chandrayan-II

http://www.indianexpress.com/news/chand ... es/485904/
Landing is the biggest business in space. If one can land, the battle is won. The only thing rest of the world dont know is how to land (except russians who landed luna).
one idea already used is 1) providing auxillary small rockets/engine which fires as landing craft descends to a certain height and help craft reduce the speed of descent to a manageable level.
To manage to land quarter/half tonnne is very chanllenging task.

I think soft-landing with help of liquid fueled/solid rockets is being planned. This would require the spacecraft to carry fuel for the landing, which will end-up increasing the launch mass of the spacecraft. Hence, I am sure that this was the reason ISRO shifted to Mk-III

Shankar · Post by **Shankar** » 12 Jul 2009 14:00

why not multiple parachutes ?

Virupaksha · Post by **Virupaksha** » 12 Jul 2009 14:02

Shankar wrote:why not multiple parachutes ?

lack of air

KrishG · Post by **KrishG** » 12 Jul 2009 14:16

Shankar wrote:why not multiple parachutes ?

There are two ways to land on the moon or any other place ---------> Soft landing and Hard landing
Hard landing is a freefall, in the case of which the lander/rover has to sufficient protection for it to not be destroyed on hitting the ground. Most designs use inflated ballon-like protection to cussion the landing. This is only possible for very small landers.
Soft landing is achieved by several methods like parachuting, rockets etc. This will also require protection for the terminal phase but considerably less than that for hard-landing. Due to the absence of atmosphere rocket firing is the common way of landing on moon. Apollo, Luna both used the same method. The spacecraft will have to carry a seperate descent module with fuel.

shynee · Post by **shynee** » 13 Jul 2009 04:02

Indian space centre plans manned space probe by 2015

Jamal K. Malik · Post by **Jamal K. Malik** » 15 Jul 2009 23:16

India building space coronograph for Sun mission

VinodTK · Post by **VinodTK** » 17 Jul 2009 04:16

India has no plans for manned moon mission: Minister

Anujan · Post by **Anujan** » 17 Jul 2009 06:58

Breaking news, chandrayaan mission in trouble because of key component malfunction.

Rahul M · Post by **Rahul M** » 17 Jul 2009 07:09

source ? details ?

Anujan · Post by **Anujan** » 17 Jul 2009 07:17

Rahul M wrote:source ? details ?

It is from IE. No details as of yet.

Muppalla · Post by **Muppalla** » 17 Jul 2009 08:02

http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/s ... 5938/253-a

Lunar Survey Spacecraft Develops an Attitude Problem
Pallava Bagla
India's first moon probe, Chandrayaan-1, has suffered a critical malfunction that jeopardizes the remainder of the mission. According to the Indian Space Research Organization, Chandrayaan-1 achieved all of its mission objectives before the malfunction was detected in May; some foreign scientists with instruments aboard Chandrayaan-1 concur that the probe performed well. But the spacecraft, which entered lunar orbit last November, can no longer orient itself with high precision.

SriniY · Post by **SriniY** » 17 Jul 2009 09:43

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/NEWS ... 787712.cms

Mentions problems with orientation of craft

SSridhar · Post by **SSridhar** » 17 Jul 2009 10:40

Star sensors on Chandrayaan-I fail

Kailash · Post by **Kailash** » 17 Jul 2009 13:32

http://www.business-standard.com/india/ ... d/68011/on

A higher orbit might have been to reduce the need for frequent adjustments. But can someone explain how the this new solution for orientation going to reduce the life?

Was the reduced life of the sat the reason the orbit was raised in the first place?

Bade · Post by **Bade** » 17 Jul 2009 19:38

http://www.isro.org/pressrelease/Jul17_2009.htm

The onboard star sensor used for determining the orientation of the spacecraft started malfunctioning on April 26, 2009. To overcome this anomaly, ISRO devised an innovative technique of using redundant sensors – gyroscopes – along with antenna pointing information and images of specific location on the surface of the moon, for determining the orientation of the spacecraft. This method has been validated and based on this information, mission operations are being carried out satisfactorily. Other than the failure of the star sensor and one of the Bus Management Units, health of the spacecraft is normal.

Shankar · Post by **Shankar** » 19 Jul 2009 17:03

BHAVINI AND SHAR TODAY– THE POWER TO THINK BEYOND TOMORROW
-AN EXCLUSSIVE BR REPORT – 19/7/2009

BHAVINI project is taking shape very fast and very definitively .India’s first 500 MW e fast breeder reactor is in an advanced stage of completion and expected to be operational by 2011 end if the present pace is maintained .The civil work for the reactor building is almost complete ,the containment vessel in position and the reactor vessel which will hold close to 1000 tons of liquid sodium at 500plus degree Celsius expected on schedule .A single 500 MW turbine generator set will provide power output to state grid once the reactor is operational and generator synchronized to grid

SHAR is taking on a new look and security is super tight and for once yours truly did not mind it .The second launch complex is truly state of the art particularly the mission control and propellant filling system real cutting edge .The fully automated fill system is totally integrated to launch control by multiple redundancy type control circuit which allows flawless pre launch fill particularly the cryo fuels and quick draining in case of a last second launch abort is commanded

The breaking news is third launch pad is cleared and this will be used to launch the our first manned mission to space carrying two Indian astronauts into low earth orbit for the first time in an Indian built rocket –GSLV mk2 that is one with India made cryogenic upper stage .The projected first launch is 2015 .

C25 project too has picked up speed .the S200 booster as well as C25 turbo pumps have cleared test in first attempt which means both the liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen pumps are now proven (fully indigenous design and manufacture).They have been operated singularly and together with gas generator and have met all design parameters .The Thrust chamber is expected to complete its qualification shortly followed by stage integration and qualification some time next year

Two launch preparations are under way GSLV MK 2 inaugural launch most likely preceded by OCEANSAT launch on PSLV just after monsoon .The GSLV D3 looked very impressive and majestic even half assembled inside vehicle assembly building.

Looking beyond tomorrow ISRO has started work on C50 cryo engine which will be mated to semi cryogenic engine powered first stage and expected to boost 8-10 ton satellite into geo transfer orbit some what in the same class as worlds most powerful Energia class of boosters.

Did not see many birds on the causeway –all the water has dried up except a solitary pair of pelicans which was big disappointment. But the news that big herds of wild bull and occasional leopard sightings inside the spec complex made my day

During lunch time NDTV broke the news of start sensor failure on Chandrayan one . The way they presented it was so nakedly biased that the ISRO officials with me were openly disgusted .Let us not forget the stupendous success of our first low cost lunar mission which so far have met all the mission objectives including photographing the lunar surface many times over can be so easily discredited by a semi illiterate interviewer on country’s number one news channel .Some times I wonder who these channels really work for .Maybe Vishnu can respond to this allegation on this channel .All of BR will appreciate that.
-Shankar

rakall · Post by **rakall** » 19 Jul 2009 17:28

Kailash wrote:http://www.business-standard.com/india/ ... d/68011/on

A higher orbit might have been to reduce the need for frequent adjustments. But can someone explain how the this new solution for orientation going to reduce the life?

Was the reduced life of the sat the reason the orbit was raised in the first place?

In a 100km orbit - there is a frequent need to "correct" the orbit, which will need fuel.. However in a 200km orbit the need to "correct" is less bcoz it is a stable orbit.. so fuel is not the problem..

The new solution for orientation is not fuel sensitive.. it has to do with adjusting the drift in the gyroscopes by taking two references - one on the moon surface (already mapped) and one reference will be Byalalu.. this is not fuel intensive; and hence mission life reducing bcoz you expend more fuel for reorientation is a wrong conclusion..

In the NDTV interview Dr.Madhavan Nair categorically states that enough fuel is there - actually extra fuel bcoz initial insertion was very accurate.. life is not a problem.. but accuracy/resolution is..

SSridhar · Post by **SSridhar** » 19 Jul 2009 17:58

Kailash wrote:http://www.business-standard.com/india/ ... d/68011/on

A higher orbit might have been to reduce the need for frequent adjustments. But can someone explain how the this new solution for orientation going to reduce the life?

Was the reduced life of the sat the reason the orbit was raised in the first place?

Kailash, attitude control of spacecraft involves two aspects: sensing and correcting.

The kind of sensors used aboard spacecraft are usually sun sensor, star tracker and gyros. The correcting mechanism employed is usually torquers, reaction wheels and thrusters. Among the sensors, the star trackers are the most accurate, giving something like 0.001 deg accuracy typically. The gyros have a tendency to accumulate errors over a period of time (called drift errors) and would therefore need to be corrected frequently by getting a new inertial update. This is what is being done by getting the fix from known locations like Bylalu and a known point (or points) on the moon itself.

Life expectancy will not be affected by this, as rakall says.

Gerard · Post by **Gerard** » 19 Jul 2009 18:10

Shankar, Thanks for that report.

Is the proposed C50 full cryo on top of the semi cryo first stage what the ISRO budget mentioned as the UMLV?

rachel · Post by **rachel** » 19 Jul 2009 20:36

You ask 'I wonder who the ENglish language biased media work for'.

No need to wonder. India is a very corrupt country. And the Middle East has lots of oil money. Put two and two together.

The enemies of India have bought all English language media. Period.

Katare · Post by **Katare** » 19 Jul 2009 21:27

I saw the same breaking news but found nothing extra ordinary in reportage, infact they also showed Madhawan Nayar's interview discussing the same failure. It is same good old DDM with their hyper bol adjectives thrown in the same way they do for all breaking news stories.

juvva · Post by **juvva** » 19 Jul 2009 22:32

SSridhar wrote:Star sensors on Chandrayaan-I fail

Is it a standard practice to have redundancy for star sensors given the apparent criticality of this component?

Bade · Post by **Bade** » 20 Jul 2009 00:15

The fact that the backup also failed points to the thermal tolerance which was exceeded at the 100km orbit as the main culprit for it. A google search reveals that off the shelf star sensors seem to operate in the temperature range of -20 to 65 degree Centigrade and the upper limit of the storage temperature range around 80 C, very close to what Chandrayaan experienced.
http://www.vectronic-aerospace.com/html ... ensor.html

Shankar · Post by **Shankar** » 20 Jul 2009 12:02

C-25 SPECIFICATION AND OPERATION

Hot gas from gas generator drives LH2 and LOX turbines in series mode which maximizes the turbo pump efficiency. Combined power of the turbo pump system is 2.17 MW having a weight of about 125 kg . The speed & delivery pressure of Lh2 pump are 38000 rpm & 9.5 MPa and the corresponding values for LOX pump are 15000 rpm & 8.3 MPa.

Thrust chamber test with high pressure feed system is expected in the first quarter of 2010 in the new test facility being established with high altitude simulation system at a cost of 100 crores. Integrated engine test of C-25 engine will be in the second half of next year.

PSLV launch will be in August and GSLV in Oct of this year. Two major events within a period of 2 months

Of course channels like NDTV will not mention these ever in their broadcast – all the will do is to sensanalize a sensor problem and operating problem arising out of all proportion.

Yes the C-50 is full cryo(LOX/LH2) as you call it to be placed on top of semi cryo stage now under project definition stage whcih will power the yet to be named booster .The thrust will also be much higher than C25 if not double)

(OOPS forgot to mention the launch pedastal for GSLV MK3 is also in advanced stage of fabrication and should be ready shortly )

Kailash · Post by **Kailash** » 20 Jul 2009 12:18

rakall wrote:In a 100km orbit - there is a frequent need to "correct" the orbit, which will need fuel.. However in a 200km orbit the need to "correct" is less bcoz it is a stable orbit.. so fuel is not the problem..

The new solution for orientation is not fuel sensitive.. it has to do with adjusting the drift in the gyroscopes by taking two references - one on the moon surface (already mapped) and one reference will be Byalalu.. this is not fuel intensive; and hence mission life reducing bcoz you expend more fuel for reorientation is a wrong conclusion..

In the NDTV interview Dr.Madhavan Nair categorically states that enough fuel is there - actually extra fuel bcoz initial insertion was very accurate.. life is not a problem.. but accuracy/resolution is..

That explains it. Thanks rakall

PratikDas · Post by **PratikDas** » 21 Jul 2009 08:58

Thank you so much, Shankarji. It isn't often that so much is presented in such a matter-of-fact way. ISRO is winning hearts and minds - there is no doubt.

arun · Post by **arun** » 23 Jul 2009 11:12

Arianespace To Launch HYLAS Telecommunications Satellite

ISRO has a role in all of this. HYLAS is based on ISRO’s I-2K bus and is designed to “bridge the digital divide” by providing broadband internet access to rural areas.

rakall · Post by **rakall** » 23 Jul 2009 22:52

ISRO annula report:

GSLV-D3 flight.

The flight stage integration of the indigenous cryogenic upper stage is in the final stage and the maiden launch of GSLV with indigenous cryo stage is planned in 2009.

The indigenous cryogenic engine develops a thrust of 73 kilo Newtons (kN) in vacuum with a specific impulse of 454 seconds and provides a payload capability of 2200 Kg to Geosynchronous Transfer Orbit (GTO) for GSLV.

GSLV MkIII

GSLV-Mk III uses new propulsion stages such as 200 tonne solid boosters, 110 tonne liquid stage and 25 tonne cryogenic upper stage. The launch of GSLV-Mk III is scheduled during 2009-10. A Solid Propellant Plant (SPP) for manufacturing S-200 solid boosters for GSLV-Mk III was successfully commissioned at SDSC SHAR. Casting and curing of one of the live S-200 segments was completed successfully achieving excellent propellant properties

RLV-TD

Scramjet engine modules (passive) for the DMRJ flight demonstration were realised and alignment / integration with the test vehicle is progressing. Real time decision based ignition of second stage, a first of its kind is ready for implementation in the test flight.

Semi Cryogenic Engine Development (SCED)
Semi-Cryogenic Engine development envisages the development of a high thrust engine producing 2000 kN (Vacuum) thrust with Liquid Oxygen and kerosene propellant combination for the Common Liquid Core in Unified Launch Vehicle (ULV). As part of semi-cryo engine development pre-project activities, five designs of single element pre-burner injector were realised and tested. Semi-cryo Project Report was prepared and clearance obtained. Conceptual design of the semi cryo engine has been completed.