Author Topic: KH-11 KENNEN  (Read 343337 times)

Offline LittleBird

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Re: KH-11 KENNEN
« Reply #800 on: 09/24/2022 05:30 am »
700lbs ... I realize time has marched on,  but that was considered a small sat in the early 1970s.
and a cost effective one, grab is from attached S3 collection posted by Blackstar a while back in SIGINT thread: https://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=40314.msg2345386#msg2345386
« Last Edit: 09/26/2022 05:15 am by LittleBird »

Offline Star One

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KH-11 KENNEN
« Reply #801 on: 09/26/2022 08:06 am »
I’ve long wondered if it is even appropriate to call the modern satellites KH-11s. Also there appears to be recent speculation of two different optical reconnaissance satellites types now being in use,  with one type seemingly able to use much smaller launchers like the F9. I wonder if this is an indication of them fulfilling two different roles, or an indication of a changing of the guard so to speak with a replacement programme overlapping the last of the ‘KH-11s’, as has been done with past programs where a successor program has overlapped with that which it is replacing.

Also if it is a successor program that this is born from the political pressure for them to do things smaller and cheaper.
« Last Edit: 09/26/2022 08:16 am by Star One »

Offline LittleBird

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Re: KH-11 KENNEN
« Reply #802 on: 09/26/2022 08:52 am »
I’ve long wondered if it is even appropriate to call the modern satellites KH-11s. Also there appears to be recent speculation of two different optical reconnaissance satellites types now being in use,  with one type seemingly able to use much smaller launchers like the F9.
If you've seen  good thread(s) on this please put link in yr post. Thanks.

One would be amazed if the F Heavy wasn't designed to be able to do this one day, even if not yet. I don't think NRO would wish to be held hostage to delays in Vulcan, surely ?

I'd love to see results of archipeppe68 getting his crayons out and putting a "KH-11" like sat next to an FH shroud. Perhaps I should commission him ;-)

Quote
I wonder if this is an indication of them fulfilling two different roles, or an indication of a changing of the guard so to speak with a replacement programme overlapping the last of the ‘KH-11s’, as has been done with past programs where a successor program has overlapped with that which it is replacing.

Also if it is a successor program that this is born from the political pressure for them to do things smaller and cheaper.
« Last Edit: 09/26/2022 01:18 pm by LittleBird »

Offline archipeppe68

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Re: KH-11 KENNEN
« Reply #803 on: 09/26/2022 09:15 am »
I'd love to see results of archipeppe getting his crayons out and putting a "KH-11" like sat next to an FH shroud. Perhaps I should commission him ;-)

Thank you so much for the appreciation.

I will do an artwork ecompassing a KH-11 within the FH's shroud.

Best regards
Giuseppe
« Last Edit: 09/26/2022 09:16 am by archipeppe68 »

Offline libra

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Re: KH-11 KENNEN
« Reply #804 on: 09/26/2022 10:54 am »
Falcon 9 (last time I checked) can throw more than 22 mt into LEO, even polar orbit - expendable mode according to Wiki. This is much  more than old Titan III  in 1976 (more akin to 40 000 pounds), and not too far from the Delta IVH. Bottom line: F9 could handle 50 000 pounds KH-11 derivatives even in "single stick" configuration.
« Last Edit: 09/26/2022 10:55 am by libra »

Offline edzieba

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Re: KH-11 KENNEN
« Reply #805 on: 09/26/2022 11:51 am »
It's more volume that is the constraint rather than mass. Even the yet-to-be-flown extended fairing for FH is smaller in diameter than the Titan IV's.

Offline LittleBird

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Re: KH-11 KENNEN
« Reply #806 on: 09/26/2022 01:27 pm »
I’ve long wondered if it is even appropriate to call the modern satellites KH-11s. 

I guess if we can have have the New Beetle, New Mini, New Fiat 500 (and I gather the New Renault 5 ere long) perhaps we should call it the New Kennen ;-)

Offline Star One

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Re: KH-11 KENNEN
« Reply #807 on: 09/26/2022 09:16 pm »
It's more volume that is the constraint rather than mass. Even the yet-to-be-flown extended fairing for FH is smaller in diameter than the Titan IV's.
Yes this is what I meant, yes it has the lift capacity but there is no way something like a KH-11 would fit on top of a F9.

Offline archipeppe68

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Re: KH-11 KENNEN
« Reply #808 on: 09/27/2022 08:41 am »
Dear All,

here it is my (requested) contribution to the topic.


Offline LittleBird

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Re: KH-11 KENNEN
« Reply #809 on: 09/28/2022 04:29 pm »
Dear All,

here it is my (requested) contribution to the topic.

I thought it would be interesting but even I didn't think it would fit like a glove !

Offline DanClemmensen

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Re: KH-11 KENNEN
« Reply #810 on: 09/28/2022 04:57 pm »
Dear All,

here it is my (requested) contribution to the topic.

I thought it would be interesting but even I didn't think it would fit like a glove !
The NSSL contract specifies three "payload categories" called A, B, and C. These are basically fairing sizes. From Wikipedia:
   "Category A payloads fit within a 4 m diameter payload envelope, category B payloads fit within a 5 m diameter payload envelope, and category C payloads require an extended 5 m diameter envelope. "
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Security_Space_Launch
I cannot tell for sure, but I think your graphic is for the category B fairing, but SpaceX had intended to also have a category C fairing.

Offline LittleBird

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Re: KH-11 KENNEN
« Reply #811 on: 09/28/2022 05:28 pm »
Dear All,

here it is my (requested) contribution to the topic.

I thought it would be interesting but even I didn't think it would fit like a glove !
The NSSL contract specifies three "payload categories" called A, B, and C. These are basically fairing sizes. From Wikipedia:
   "Category A payloads fit within a 4 m diameter payload envelope, category B payloads fit within a 5 m diameter payload envelope, and category C payloads require an extended 5 m diameter envelope. "
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Security_Space_Launch
I cannot tell for sure, but I think your graphic is for the category B fairing, but SpaceX had intended to also have a category C fairing.

Giuseppe's excellent graphic not mine, but thanks.  I'd assume the category C would be a large GEO option, and also maybe other things with large antennae, like radars.

Offline LittleBird

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Re: KH-11 KENNEN
« Reply #812 on: 10/11/2022 05:50 pm »
Moving this from sixties SIGINT thread:

I think the bullet points in this video are the 60 key innovations:



[Edit: When I've some spare time I'll list them.]


Interested to see this pic from NRO video above, wondering which one(s) of the Keyhole/IMINT threads should I post it to ?

Is it likely to be KENNEN-related, or MOL-, or what ?

[Edit: added a second angle on the mystery tube, hat tip to hoku for posting this in the SIGINT thread.]
« Last Edit: 10/17/2022 06:50 am by LittleBird »

Offline kevin-rf

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Re: KH-11 KENNEN
« Reply #813 on: 10/11/2022 08:02 pm »
Online there are several images of technicians next to the Hubble mirror (same diameter as the KH-11). Here is one. To me, they look roughly the same size. So, not MOL...
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Offline Blackstar

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Offline leovinus

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Re: KH-11 KENNEN
« Reply #815 on: 11/18/2022 03:43 pm »

Offline edzieba

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Re: KH-11 KENNEN
« Reply #816 on: 11/18/2022 07:44 pm »
Pulled the original image from the pdf and re-levelled it. Still looks like less actual detail then in the tweeted image.

Offline LittleBird

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Re: KH-11 KENNEN
« Reply #817 on: 02/09/2023 09:57 am »
Belatedly  (sorry!) moving the SPIN SCAN discussion here from the MOL and KH7/8 threads as this seems best place.

Re edzieba's ballpark estimate of what SPIN SCAN could do:

I did some back-of-the-napkin, and a completely unmodified TIROS/ESSL flown at 150km rather than its usual altitude could achieve ~200m ground resolution. A fair way off of CORONA's 1-2m, but switching to larger vidicons and longer focal length lenses might actually put a usable resolution within reach.

I wondered if the attached 1973 by Gehrels, Suomi and Krauss https://www.lpl.arizona.edu/sites/default/files/sic/collection/journal/191_Gehrels_CommLPL_1973.pdf might give any clues at all as to what contemporary spin scan sensors, broadly defined, could do. I see that they talk about Landsat's multispectral scanners not the RBVs, but was just curious really.

I see that spin scan can take a number of related meanings, including the ATS  etc sensor when the earth is moving slowly as seen from GEO.

[Anyway back to my travel claims and unfinished papers ;-)]

Offline edzieba

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Re: KH-11 KENNEN
« Reply #818 on: 02/09/2023 12:08 pm »
If SPIN-SCAN instead referred to flying spot photomultiplier imagers, that opens up the trade space on angular resolution vs. field of view (move the spot slower = smaller view, higher resolution). But it also ties the system somewhat to FROG - FROG used a flying spot scanner internally to scan out the developed film, so it would effectively mean eliminating the film subsystem at the expense of needing the actuated mirror(s) and/or spacecraft spin to steer the spot, and the need to either set up a relay network or internally bufer and read out scan data (whereas FROG could just wait until it was over a ground station before starting scanout, without needing the buffer the data).

Offline LittleBird

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Re: KH-11 KENNEN
« Reply #819 on: 02/10/2023 03:54 pm »
Thinking laterally, it's also interesting, though possibly not relevant exactly, to recall that Merton Davies and RAND colleagues designed a spinning reconsat right at the beginning of the game, see nice account here by Augenstein and Murray:

https://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/corporate_pubs/2005/CP476.pdf

He patented the method in 1964, and another RAND doc, attached, describes it see  grab.

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