All this discussion of Orlets spysats is wonderful, but were any of them launched in 1993-94, which would be necessary for a 17F112 type spacecraft with a 17D62 engine to end up in Mexico in late 1994, early 1995?
The 17Д62 is an integrated propulsion system with 1,800 kg of propellant; once considered for use with Dnepr. Is that too big for a Neman?
Quote from: Stan Black on 08/28/2012 05:57 pm The 17Д62 is an integrated propulsion system with 1,800 kg of propellant; once considered for use with Dnepr. Is that too big for a Neman?What is the source for the information that the 17D62 was considered for use with Dnepr?My understanding is that the Neman propulsion system is virtually identical to that of Resurs-DK (basically a civilian version of Neman). Resurs-DK had a propellant mass of 900 kg, half that of the 17D62.
Quote from: B. Hendrickx on 08/28/2012 11:14 pmQuote from: Stan Black on 08/28/2012 05:57 pm The 17Д62 is an integrated propulsion system with 1,800 kg of propellant; once considered for use with Dnepr. Is that too big for a Neman?What is the source for the information that the 17D62 was considered for use with Dnepr?My understanding is that the Neman propulsion system is virtually identical to that of Resurs-DK (basically a civilian version of Neman). Resurs-DK had a propellant mass of 900 kg, half that of the 17D62. http://www.novosti-kosmonavtiki.ru/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=8343&start=45
I’ve contacted Vladimir Zavyalov, the veteran of the Isayev design bureau that I’ve mentioned in my earlier posts. He tells me that the 17D62 was only flown on the Zenit-launched Orlets-2 and the Proton-launched Araks/Arkon, the big spysat built by NPO Lavochkin. He says there were plans to use the 17D62 on Soyuz-launched spacecraft, but these never materialized. This means that the 17D62 flew only four times :Kosmos-2290 (Orlets-2) (26 August 1994)Kosmos-2344 (Arkon) (6 June 1997)Kosmos-2372 (Orlets-2) (25 September 2000)Kosmos-2392 (Arkon) (25 July 2002)So this still leaves Kosmos-2290 as the only candidate for the debris found in Mexico. That would imply that the fragment was found not in December 1994 (as all sources seem to claim), but sometime after 4 April 1995 (when Kosmos-2290 was deorbited). It also means that the Military Space Forces press release about Kosmos-2290 having come down 2720 km east of Wellington, New Zealand must have been wrong.Zavyalov has taken a look at the pictures of the recovered fragment and thinks it is from “the nozzle section of the main engine’s combustion chamber”.