Russia Plans "long-lived" Venus Probe |
Russia Plans "long-lived" Venus Probe |
Nov 7 2005, 07:19 PM
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Newbie Group: Members Posts: 12 Joined: 6-November 05 From: Bexleyheath, Kent, United Kingdom Member No.: 545 |
Russia Plans "Long-Lived" Venus Probe The press secretary of the Russian Federal Space Agency, Vyacheslav Davidenko, has said that Russia will design and launch a long-living probe to Venus by 2015. The probe is known as Venera-D. Davidenko told a news briefing that within the federal Space budget for 2006-2015 was envisaged, “work to develop a principally new spacecraft, Venera D, intended for detailed studies of the atmosphere and surface of Venus”. “It is expected that the craft with a long, more than one month period of active existence will land on the surface of the planet that is the nearest to the earth. Nobody has done such thing on Venus so far.” Source: ITAR-TASS -------------------- "Space is big. Really big. You just won't believe how vastly, hugely, mind-boggingly big it is. I mean, you may think it's a long way down the street to the chemist, but that's just peanuts to space."
The Hitch-Hikers Guide to the Galaxy Douglas Adams 1952 - 2001 |
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Nov 9 2005, 12:23 AM
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Newbie Group: Members Posts: 12 Joined: 6-November 05 From: Bexleyheath, Kent, United Kingdom Member No.: 545 |
QUOTE (ljk4-1 @ Nov 8 2005, 09:37 PM) The later Veneras (9-15) only had to use their aerobreak disk to land safely on Venus once released from the entry shell, the atmosphere is that thick. Imagine something like a coin drifting down to the bottom of a pond, only more stable. I can see the sense in this system. With these Venera craft having such a short life span it would be imperative to get them onto the surface as quickly as possible. The last thing you would want is for the spacecraft to die whilst it is still dangling from a parachute. Does anyone know at what altitude the craft seperated from the aero-sheild / parachute? QUOTE But another possibility for the VGA is a simple vertical windmill fastened to the gondola, utilizing the flow of dense air past the gondola during descent and ascent to run a generator recharging onboard batteries. Does this system actually make sense? For a short lived vehicle the battery life isn't the major consideration. The craft itself is likely to die before the batteries. For a long lived craft then the amount of battery time conserved is negligable compared to the life of the probe. Even on a short lived lander this system would only make any sense to me if the windmill / battery recharging system were to offer a weight reduction over the additional batteries required for the re-entry landing phase of the mission. Even then the added complexity of the system makes it more likely to fail, actually reducing the lifetime of the lander. -------------------- "Space is big. Really big. You just won't believe how vastly, hugely, mind-boggingly big it is. I mean, you may think it's a long way down the street to the chemist, but that's just peanuts to space."
The Hitch-Hikers Guide to the Galaxy Douglas Adams 1952 - 2001 |
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