KickSat explained

KickSat was a satellite dispenser for small-satellite (femtosatellite) project inaugurated in early October 2011, to launch many very small satellites from a 3U CubeSat. The satellites have been characterized as being the size of a large postage stamp.[1] [2] and also as "cracker size".[3] The mission launch was originally scheduled for late 2013 and was launched April 18, 2014.[4] [5]

Kicksat reached its orbit and transmitted beacon signals that were received by radio amateurs. Telemetry data allowed the prediction of the orbit and the reentry on May 15, 2014, at about 01:30 UTC. Due to a non-redundant design, a timer reset while on-orbit and the femtosatellites were not deployed in time, and burned up inside the KickSat mothership when the undeployed satellite-deployment mechanism reentered Earth's atmosphere. It is one of several crowdfunded satellites launched during the 2010s.[6]

History

The project was crowdfunded through Kickstarter.[7] [8] [9] The project was advertised with the goal of reducing the cost of spaceflight so that it could be affordable on an individual basis.[10] [11] [12] [13]

Design

In its minimal configuration, each Sprite femtosatellite will be designed to send a very short message (a few bytes long) to a network of ground stations.[14] The chipset of use is a TI CC430F5137 (MCU + RF) with codebase from panStamp.Firmware developer kits were sent to donors who contributed enough to qualify for customizing their own Sprite.[15]

Sprites can be organized into fleets; one of them was to be named for the British Interplanetary Society.[16] London Hackspace had begun work on its own ground station.[17]

Inaugural mission

KickSat launched on an ISS commercial resupply mission, SpaceX CRS-3, originally scheduled for late 2013,[18] but ultimately delayed until April 18, 2014.[19] On April 30, 2014, the microcontroller managing the master clock was found to have reset due to a technical problem, an effect of space radiation. This reset added two weeks to the deployment schedule for the sprites, and started a race against time to charge KickSat's battery enough to power deployment of the sprites before KickSat began atmospheric reentry. On May 14, 2014, KickSat reentered the atmosphere and burned up; all sprites were lost.[20]

Other missions

Sprites were launched on board the during STS-134 in May 2011, and spent three years mounted to the outside of the ISS as part of the eighth Materials International Space Station Experiment. Upon their return to Earth, they were still functional. This verified the design could survive the space environment for far longer than the planned nominal mission length.

In 2016, the KickSat Sprite was discussed as an early-stage prototype of the interstellar probe proposed for Breakthrough Starshot.[21]

On June 23, 2017, the PSLV-C38 launch carried 31 satellites into low Earth orbit. Among them were Max Valier, built by OHB of (Germany) and Venta-1 which were carrying six sprite spacecraft as secondary payloads.[22] [23]

After being shortlisted in February 2015 by NASA under its CubeSat Launch Initiative, KickSat-2 was launched aboard Cygnus NG-10 SS John Glenn on November 17, 2018.[24] [25] After detaching from the ISS, the free-flying Cygnus spacecraft deployed KickSat-2 at an altitude of 300 km on February 13, 2019.[26] KickSat-2 established communication with ground controllers soon after, reporting good health despite a weaker than expected signal.[27] On March 18, 2019, KickSat-2 deployed 105 Sprites which successfully transmitted data before reentering the atmosphere.[28] [29] [30] [31]

Further reading

External links

Notes and References

  1. Web site: KickSat to Launch Postage Stamp-sized Satellites into Space for $300 . Radu Tyrsina . . October 11, 2011 . October 16, 2011 . https://web.archive.org/web/20111014050625/http://www.mobilemag.com/2011/10/11/kicksat-to-launch-postage-stamp-sized-satellites-into-space-for-300/ . October 14, 2011 . dead .
  2. Web site: Explore Space with a Spacecraft The Size of a Postage Stamp . Elizabeth . Fish . Geek Tech (blog) . November 14, 2011 . November 15, 2011 .
  3. News: Garling. Caleb . Personal satellites that fly into space . December 26, 2012 . San Francisco Chronicle . December 24, 2012 .
  4. Web site: KickSat Has Been Deployed in Low-Earth Orbit. arrl.org. April 19, 2014. April 26, 2014.
  5. News: O'Neill . Ian . Helium Leak Forces SpaceX Launch Scrub . April 15, 2014 . news.discovery.com . April 14, 2014 .
  6. Web site: DIY Satellites: Now and Near Future Make. Reyes. Matthew. April 7, 2014. Make: DIY Projects and Ideas for Makers. en. 2019-01-05.
  7. Web site: KickSat – Your personal spacecraft in space! . Zachary Manchester . October 4, 2011 . . October 16, 2011 .
  8. Kickstarter project will launch hundreds of personal satellites into space . Mark Brown . . October 10, 2011 . October 16, 2011 . https://web.archive.org/web/20151001112546/http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2011-10/10/kicksat . October 1, 2015 . dead .
  9. Web site: An orbit of your own, "KickSat" crowdsources spaceflight . Wayne Hall . November 17, 2011 . Kentucky Science & Technology Corporation . November 20, 2011 . dead . https://web.archive.org/web/20111119090052/http://www.kentuckyspace.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=381:qkicksatq-interview&catid=45:kentuckyspaceblog&Itemid=1 . November 19, 2011 .
  10. Web site: Send your own satellite into space . Boonsri Dickinson . October 10, 2011 . . October 18, 2011 .
  11. Web site: October 21, 2011 . Michael Doornbos . Evadot Podcast No. 86 – Would you like to have your own spacecraft in space? Kicksat.org says you can . Evadot.com . November 20, 2011 .
  12. Web site: Johnson. Michael. Manchester. Zachary. Peck. Mason. KickSat.org – an open source ChipSat dispenser and citizen space exploration proof of concept mission. https://web.archive.org/web/20160303221411/https://www.cubesatsymposium.eu/4thsymposium/bookofabstracts_cubesatsymposium.pdf. dead. March 3, 2016. 91. Von Karman Institute for Fluid Dynamics. Rhode-Saint-Genèse (Brussels), Belgium. July 13, 2013. January 30, 2012.
  13. Web site: von Karman Institute for Fluid Dynamics. Fourth European CubeSat Symposium. July 13, 2013. dead. https://archive.today/20130713192730/https://www.cubesatsymposium.eu/4thsymposium/presentation.php. July 13, 2013.
  14. Web site: Sprites – The Computer Chip-Sized Spacecraft That Will Send You a Text Message (for $300) . Peter Murray . October 15, 2011 . Singularity Hub . October 16, 2011 . dead . https://web.archive.org/web/20111017084954/http://singularityhub.com/2011/10/15/sprites-%E2%80%93-the-computer-chip-sized-spacecraft-that-will-send-you-a-text-message-for-300/ . October 17, 2011 .
  15. Web site: KickSat: Send Tiny DIY Satellites Into Space . John Biggs . October 9, 2011 . . October 16, 2011 .
  16. Web site: bis-space.com: Featured Articles . . Join the BIS in space . Andrew Vaudin . October 24, 2011 . October 25, 2011 . December 16, 2011 . https://web.archive.org/web/20111216143523/http://www.bis-space.com/2011/10/24/2950/join-the-bis-in-space . dead .
  17. Web site: November 19, 2011 . AMSAT-UK . London Hackspace work on HackSat1 . AMSAT-UK . November 20, 2011 .
  18. News: . Bruce Dorminey . November 28, 2012 . First Kickstarter Funded Satellites To Launch in 2013 . December 26, 2012 .
  19. Web site: . Worldwide Launch Schedule . December 3, 2012 .
  20. Web site: KickSat has reentered. May 18, 2014.
  21. Web site: This Is The Tiny Spaceship That Could Take Us To Alpha Centauri. Dave Gershgorn. April 13, 2016. PopSci. May 13, 2017.
  22. Web site: "Max Valier" nano-satellite successfully launched – OHB System ENG. www.ohb-system.de. 2019-03-25.
  23. Web site: Ar Venta-1 palīdzību kosmosā nogādāts pasaulē mazākais satelīts KickSat Ventspils Augstskola. https://web.archive.org/web/20170701060708/http://venta.lv/2017/06/24/ar-venta-1-palidzibu-kosmosa-nogadats-pasaule-mazakais-satelits-kicksat/. dead. July 1, 2017. July 1, 2017. 2019-03-25.
  24. Web site: NASA Announces University CubeSat Space Mission Candidates. NASA. February 6, 2015.
  25. NASA Approves Kicksat's Tiny DIY Satellites for Second Attempt. Alasdair Allan. April 13, 2015. Make. April 17, 2015.
  26. Web site: NG-10 Cygnus ends post-ISS mission after deploying satellites. February 25, 2019. SpaceFlight Insider. en-US. 2019-03-26. March 27, 2019. https://web.archive.org/web/20190327101404/https://www.spaceflightinsider.com/missions/iss/ng-10-cygnus-ends-post-iss-mission-after-deploying-satellites/. dead.
  27. Web site: KickSat-2 is Alive and Being Tracked. www.arrl.org. 2019-03-26.
  28. Web site: Inexpensive chip-size satellites orbit Earth. University. Stanford. June 3, 2019. Stanford News. en. 2019-06-03.
  29. Web site: What is KickSat-2?. Tavares. Frank. May 30, 2019. NASA. 2019-06-05.
  30. Web site: Cracker-sized satellites demonstrate new space tech. Cornell Chronicle. en. 2019-06-05.
  31. Web site: KickSat-2 project launches 105 cracker-sized satellites. TechCrunch. June 4, 2019 . en-US. 2019-06-05.

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