can they drop like 100+ landers all over the moon like they launched 104 satellites? Some of them will have a good landing for sure.
can they drop like 100+ landers all over the moon like they launched 104 satellites? Some of them will have a good landing for sure.
The TMC-2 on the Lunar orbiter apparently should be be able to map the terrain of the Lunar surface, including the poles, with incredible efficiency and precision and hopefully the 3D modelling that we hope to make of the lunar surface will help us with selecting future safe landing sites. Not sure we have any instrument on the orbiter that can significantly enhance our understanding of Lunar gravity and its magnetic fields....
I had also posted the link about it earlier. The communication was lost very close to the surface. Thats why the lander is still in one piece. But I guess if it was possible to communicate with it we would had already done it by now. I guess ISRO director has also given up on it. He has asked the scientists to concentrate on future projects. Although I am still wondering if they will attempt this project again anytime soon.
It is indeed a pride for SF to have posters as welll as a proof of great scientific achievement that they have been successful in transplanting grey matter in their backside
Here we can see Vikram descent to 335 meters. The big question is at what speed it was descending?
View attachment 9923
I already said this on the 7th itself the Vikram could be seen at 335 m on the graph plot
Guys, I said exactly the same thing on the 7th Sept itself. And after one week the same analysis is being put forth
Chandrayaan-2: How a somersault did Vikram lander in – Indian Defence Research Wing
In the early hours of September 6, the Chandrayaan-2 lander began its descent on to the lunar surface. The descent was to last around 15 minutes and initially everything seemed to be going according to plan.
Around 11 minutes after Vikram began its decent, things went haywire.
At that point, Vikram was supposed to rotate slightly so that its cameras could map the lunar surface for a suitable landing site. During this crucial movement, Vikram unexpectedly and inexplicably performed a somersault.
For a brief moment the Chandrayaan-2 lander was upside down over the lunar surface. What this meant was that the reverse thrust-producing engines, which were slowing Vikram down, faced the sky for some time. And so, instead of slowing the craft down, the engines actually pushed the Vikram lander down towards the lunar surface.
This was clearly visible in the final readings sent by Vikram — at 11 minutes and 28 seconds after beginning its descent, Vikram’s vertical velocity (the speed with which it was descending on to the Moon) was 42.9 metres per second. A minute and a half later, the speed dramatically increased to 58.9 metres per second.
And I had posted why it did the somersault and how the original design was changed which resulted in this somersault.
No offense dude..But did you ever wonder why ISRO claimed to have lost communication at 2.1 km altitude when the displays clearly showed much lesser than that?
with due respect to all scientists and engineers of ISRO, we missed this time by few hundred meters
better luck next time!
better luck next time!
All the time watching feed from ISRO center, the blip was stuck at 2.1 km. So in the next 5-10 minutes, Sivan and team concluded that communication was lost at that point.
The 335 m plot on the descent graph was from one of NASA's DSN in Australia or the US. It is possible that ISRO and NASA captured and processed the signal in different ways or NASA's DSN is more powerful to even capture very weak signal reflected back from moon's surface, just in case the antenna was pointing upside down.
Even if ISRO reconciled the descent with NASA's observation and may have agreed to 335 m, ISRO have refrained from making any further communication since the time of failure. They may be trying to come to a firm conclusion before they speak, rather than release flip-flopping on their findings.
On the flip-flop, we have to understand that we are dealing with Chandrayaan-2 and ISRO, and not Balakot and DGISPR.
Any ways, on a serious note, what is your thought on this divergence on communication loss elevation?
Even the live telecast by DD from ISRO showed last altitude to be 335 m. You can see at 1:48 in this video. That rules out any difference between ISRO and NASA. Frankly speaking I have no clue why ISRO claimed it to be 2.1 km. But I am sure they are smart enough not to make such a obvious mistake.
May be the display is not actual altitude, but the extrapolated one from the previous set of data. The transmission from Moon and further processing takes around 2 seconds. To avoid time lag, they might be displaying extrapolated data. Hence even though transmission stopped at 2.1km, display panel kept on displaying it till 335m.
I know for sure GPS receivers do use extrapolation. You might have observed if you miss any exit on freeway, the GPS display keeps showing the car on the projected lane and after few seconds jumps to actual lane. However, I have no clue why would ISRO use this!!
"Communication" per se must be the process of receiving composite set of real time data from the Lander. However, it is always possible that they received just the "altitude" data on a specific band which worked till 335 m and the rest on some other band which worked only till 2.1 km. Anything is possible. Will come to know of the details when ISRO speaks up.
I dont think communication with rover will be established again. If they could do it they would have done it by now. Probably lander is damaged. But I am wondering if ISRO has already figured out the cause of communication failure and what happened to lander afterwards.
Obviously Lander won't user High gain antenna to communicate with Orbiter. There must be an additional omnidirection antenna that may or may not be damaged on landing.
Just like Ethernet on 8 pin copper media and isdn on long distance telephone, vikram may have both short and long range communication medium. Isro is hoping for short range comms to be active.
the short range comm is also not working I guess. the orbiter files over it many times a day. If the communication had to happen, it would have happened by now. and I guess the lunar night might have also started to sin in by now.
I gave up long ago.
Let's focus on orbiter and have breakthrough discoveries with it. Orbiter is one that's carrying critical equipments and fuel for future use