Re: Chinese Satellites
6 launches in less than 2 months to send up 10 satellites? Seems improbably, unless the comment was referring to financial, instead of calendar year. But I guess we will see.
Well,well guess what today they launched 2 more satellite. The tally is now16 and 4 more to go
Long March 2D launches two research satellites for China
November 19th, 2011 by Rui C. Barbosa
After the successful return of Shenzhou-8 on November 17, China entered on the final phase of its 2011 launch schedule with the launch of two research satellites, the SW-4 Shiyyan Weixing and the Chuang Xin-1 (3), from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center. The launch took place at 00:15 UTC on Sunday from the 603 (SLS-2) launch complex using a Long March (Chang Zheng) 2D launch vehicle.
Chinese Launch:
The Shiyan Weixing-4 bird is a technology demonstrator satellite and will be used for experiments on new technologies. The satellites separated from the second stage of the launcher at around 0030UTC.
Also known as Tansuo-1 (28220 2004-012A), the first technological demonstrator SW-1 Shiyan Weixing-1 was launched at 1559UTC on April 18, 2004 by the CZ-2C Chang Zheng-2C (Y14) from the Xichang Satellite Launch Center. Supposedly, this satellite was part of China’s first digital imaging system capable of stereo Earth-terrain mapping.
The second satellite of this series, SW-2 (28479 2004-046A) was launched at 1045UTC on November 18, 2004 by the CZ-2C Chang Zheng-2C (Y15) also from the Xichang Satellite Launch Center and its mission was similar to the SW-1 mission.
SW-3 Shiyan Weixing-3 (33433 2008-056A), launched at 0015:06.909UTC on November 5, 2008, by the CZ-2D Chang Zheng-2D (Y12) was a technology demonstrator satellite and was used for experiments on new technologies in atmospheric exploration, according to its developer, the Harbin Institute of Technology.
The second satellite on board, the Chuang Xin-1 (3), was developed by the China Academy of Sciences and according to the state media the main mission objectives are atmospheric space environment detection system validation of new technologies and domestic components, assemblies and a variety of on-orbit testing and evaluation of a new payload.
The new satellite is also testing a system on the basis of satellite platform optimization, implemented around the flexible integration of payloads with high functionality.
The first Chuang Xin-1 (28058 2003-049B) satellite was launched piggyback on the CBERS-2 satellite at 0316UTC on October 21, 2003 by the CZ-4B Chan Zheng-4B (Y4) from the Taiyuan Satellite Launch Center and the second satellite of the series was launched at November 5, 2008, together with SW-3