China's Space Program News Thread

[Equation]

I cringed for the duration of the video because the commentators were horrible. They either don't know English, or they don't know what they are talking about.

I said both, they don't know how to translate the scientific meanings into English.

 

[mr.bean]

I cringed for the duration of the video because the commentators were horrible. They either don't know English, or they don't know what they are talking about.

you're better off turning the volume to mute and just watch the images.

 

[Quickie]

Focusing only on their explanation of the technical aspects of the CE-3 launch and orbital insertion, I actually don't see any error in them.

 

[Equation]

Focusing only on their explanation of the technical aspects of the CE-3 launch and orbital insertion, I actually don't see any error in them.

It's not what they say, but rather how they say it. All those "uuhhs" and fishing for the right word to complete a full sentence can get annoying for me sometimes.

 

[blacklist]

Why haven't we seen any report of of the lander testing its descent on Earth? I don't think they just do their testing on computer simulations.

I doubt that they need to test the lander on the open ground, in fact the test may need special room to simulate moon gravity.

btw, i hope when china will send their 1st taikonaut... hopefully there will be 1 female among them so she would be the first female on the moon.

 

[Quickie]

Why haven't we seen any report of of the lander testing its descent on Earth? I don't think they just do their testing on computer simulations.

I recall the lander was reported to be tested in Beijing but the report never said how lunar gravity could be simulated in the testing.

 

[escobar]

Time synchronization between the launch site and the ground or sea control station goes through Beidou-2 system atomic clocks

[video=youtube;CwgqNif7Euo]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CwgqNif7Euo#t=0[/video]

LM-3B history

[video=youtube;2svO27VNf7E]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2svO27VNf7E#t=0[/video]

 

[escobar]

After CE-3 launch, XSLC staff are oer the moon...

[video=youtube;6jCCI8IkZ18]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6jCCI8IkZ18#t=0[/video]

CE-3 has already successfully performed one mid-course correction

[video=youtube;89XD-WhUDhk]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=89XD-WhUDhk#t=0[/video]

 

[Equation]

After CE-3 launch, XSLC staff are oer the moon...

[video=youtube;6jCCI8IkZ18]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6jCCI8IkZ18#t=0[/video]

CE-3 has already successfully performed one mid-course correction

[video=youtube;89XD-WhUDhk]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=89XD-WhUDhk#t=0[/video]

The girl on the far right is kinda cute from the first video and so is the reporter from the second vid.

 

[escobar]

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

Two months after the obscure launch of China's new quick-response rocket, not many details have emerged on the Kuaizhou launch vehicle and its payload carrying the same name. Orbital activity of the satellite, however, has shown that the spacecraft is maintaining a very low orbit using propulsive maneuvers.

Kuaizhou launched on September 25 from the Jiquan Satellite Launch Center and was detected in orbit a short time later, but virtually no details on the new launch vehicle or the satellite were given except that the spacecraft "will be used to monitor natural disasters and provide disaster-relief information for its user, the National Remote Sensing Center of China..."

In the weeks after the launch, some unconfirmed details on the launch vehicle were provided by Chinese sources. Kuaizhou, meaning "Speedy Vessel," is an all-solid, four-stage launch vehicle with an integrated 4th stage/satellite design to reduce mass. This is in line with tracking information as only one object was detected in orbit after the launch.

Unless the fourth stage was quickly deorbited which is highly unlikely, the Kuaizhou upper stage remained attached to the spacecraft.

According to reports, the KZ launch vehicle weighs around 30 metric tons and has a Low-Earth Orbit payload capability between 400 and 500 Kilograms which is similar, although slightly less, than the American Minotaur I launcher that can deliver 580kg to LEO at a launch mass of 36 tons. The nominal insertion altitude of the KZ launcher is about 300 Kilometers.

Reportedly, Kuaizhou can be readied for liftoff with less than half a day's notice. This quick countdown and the low initial orbit makes the vehicle perfectly suitable to launch intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) assets into a variety of orbits depending on coverage targets.

Although the Kuaizhou 1 satellite is officially being used for disaster monitoring, the spacecraft payload, an optical imager with a ground resolution of about one meter, can be used to demonstrate ISR capability to evaluate future military use of such spacecraft. A successor, Kuaizhou 2, is being readied for launch in 2014 to perform a similar mission with an improved optical payload that provides a ground resolution better than 0.5m.

After being launched in September, Kuaizhou 1 has performed a number of orbital maneuvers using its onboard propulsion system to demonstrate that it can maintain its low working orbit and perform orbit changes to set up observation passes over a chosen target which is a critical requirement for ISR spacecraft.

The KZ-1 satellite was inserted into an initial orbit of 275 by 293 Kilometers at an inclination of 96.7 degrees. This is a relatively short lived orbit that would decay within approximately five weeks. About two days after launch, the vehicle performed its first maneuvers and climbed into a 299 by 306-Kilometer orbit.

Since then, Kuaizhou 1 has performed orbit-raising maneuvers roughly every two weeks to maintain its orbit at a mean altitude of 281 to 305 Kilometers with perigee not dipping below 267 Kilometers. In this low orbit, KZ-1 is keeping itself about four to six weeks from re-entry. Operational orbits at these low altitudes have been common among optical surveillance satellites.

As an example, the Russian Kobalt reconnaissance spacecraft have been operated in orbits of 180 to 350 Kilometers to acquire high-resolution images that were returned to Earth via film-capsules. Yantar/Kobalt missions had relatively short durations of one to five months owed to the low operational orbit. The newer surveillance architecture that does not rely on film-return uses spacecraft in higher orbits such as the Russian Persona spacecraft orbiting above 700 Kilometers and the American KH-11 satellites in elliptical orbits. These spacecraft have mission durations of several years and sometimes more than a decade.

It will be interesting to see how long the small Kuaizhou 1 satellite can keep itself in that orbit before exhausting its propellant supply to learn more about China's space-based quick-response ISR assets.