Quote from: whitelancer64 on 04/13/2018 09:34 pmQuote from: Ben the Space Brit on 04/13/2018 08:54 pmTESS is tiny. Was there ever a point when it was considered a possible payload for the cancelled Falcon-1e?Also, the Falcon 1e was cancelled long before the award of the TESS launch contract (in Dec. 2014), it was always going to fly on a Falcon 9.In the TESS video, they said they designed it for a Minotaur and that the Falcon 9 was a "monster" IIRC. So they designed it for a much smaller rocket and got a F9 in the end. They would have designed it differently if it were slated for a F9 from the start.
Quote from: Ben the Space Brit on 04/13/2018 08:54 pmTESS is tiny. Was there ever a point when it was considered a possible payload for the cancelled Falcon-1e?Also, the Falcon 1e was cancelled long before the award of the TESS launch contract (in Dec. 2014), it was always going to fly on a Falcon 9.
TESS is tiny. Was there ever a point when it was considered a possible payload for the cancelled Falcon-1e?
So is it a huge let down to all of the engineers, designers, and the like that worked countless hours saving grams off of each piece of TESS that it's now the lightest payload ever flown by Falcon 9 and could have been much more massive?
Quote from: Ben the Space Brit on 04/13/2018 08:54 pmTESS is tiny. Was there ever a point when it was considered a possible payload for the cancelled Falcon-1e?The F9 is delivering TESS to a 200x 270 000km orbit, just a tiny bit outside the capabilities of falcon 1e.
Quote from: pb2000 on 04/13/2018 09:11 pmQuote from: Ben the Space Brit on 04/13/2018 08:54 pmTESS is tiny. Was there ever a point when it was considered a possible payload for the cancelled Falcon-1e?The F9 is delivering TESS to a 200x 270 000km orbit, just a tiny bit outside the capabilities of falcon 1e.I thought TESS has a kick stage to take it up from 600 x 600 to 600 x 200,000 km ... is Falcon handling that now?
So that is a pretty big benefit of the switch to F9. Eliminating the kick stage must eliminate a fair number of failure modes, a lot of complexity and all the cost that goes with that. Not having to scrap over every gram can’t hurt either.
Quote from: Norm38 on 04/15/2018 03:54 amSo that is a pretty big benefit of the switch to F9. Eliminating the kick stage must eliminate a fair number of failure modes, a lot of complexity and all the cost that goes with that. Not having to scrap over every gram can’t hurt either. That and a couple hundred million bucks cheaper.I look forward to seeing what probes NASA produces when launches are $60 million instead of $200 or $300.Surely there are scientists day dreaming about what payloads they can put on a FH.Do a great job on this one SpaceX and you're on your way.The TESS data is going to be amazing too, can't wait.
AIUI TESS was originally designed for higher acceleration of a solid launcher, so the F9 upper stage will not be throttling back as much like for other payloads. Maybe SpaceX will over-performed with final orbital insertion burn and add many more years of service life.
As a fascinating segue: I am truly stunned that with the launch first contracted in 2014 for August 2017, even after vehicle failures in 2015 and 2016, TESS' launch date slipped right EIGHT MONTHS. That feels like an insane achievement, to me.
For TESS, 30 second launch window is for COLA (Collision Avoidance). Should a COLA be needed, they can shift the launch time by as much as 30 seconds to the right.
SpaceX will try to bring rocket upper stage back from orbital velocity using a giant party balloon
QuoteSpaceX will try to bring rocket upper stage back from orbital velocity using a giant party balloonApril's Fools was two weeks ago, so he's a bit late.