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Path: utzoo!kcarroll
From: kcarroll@utzoo.UUCP (Kieran A. Carroll)
Newsgroups: net.space
Subject: Re:comsat too smooth to latch onto, and spinning too fast
Message-ID: <3561@utzoo.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 20-Feb-84 14:51:07 EST
Article-I.D.: utzoo.3561
Posted: Mon Feb 20 14:51:07 1984
Date-Received: Mon, 20-Feb-84 14:51:07 EST
References: <16645@sri-arpa.UUCP>
Organization: U of Toronto Zoology
Lines: 21

*

   One objection that's been voiced against trying to recapture
the Palapa and the other recently stranded satellite is that the
thing's spinning, and that it'd be too hard for the shuttle
to grapple a spinning object.  Now, in our spacecraft design class, 
we were told that standard practice when designing spinners
is to include spin-up/spin-down thrusters.  Does anyone on the
net know enough about the design of these satellites, to know
if this is the case here?  If it is, the satellite could spin itself
down, before the shuttle tried to capture it.

   By the way, I do realize that the satellite was spun up by a spin
table on the shuttle before release, which seems to suggest no
radial thrusters.  However, this may have been done in order to
ensure the spin axis was the one desired, and to conserve
manoeuvering fuel on the satellite itself, so it doesn't tell us right
away whether or not radial jets are there.

-Kieran A. Carroll
...decvax!utzoo!kcarroll