Screenshot from SpaceX Webcast of the Eutelsat 10B launch - Me too. No grid fins or landing legs
Mission Rundown: SpaceX Falcon 9 - Eutelsat 10B
Written: November 23, 2022
That’s enough. I’m clocking out too
SpaceX is set to launch a communication satellite to geostationary transfer orbit (GTO) for Eutelsat Communications (Euronext Paris: ETL) that has with Thales Alenia Space built the communication satellite EUTELSAT 10B, a new all-electric satellite built on the Spacebus NEO platform. The satellite will be located at 10° East, an orbital position that offers a unique visibility spanning from the Americas to Asia. It will ensure service continuity for existing customers on EUTELSAT 10A.
The EUTELSAT 10B satellite will be launched from SpaceX’s Space Launch Complex 40, at the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, in Florida, USA and into a super-synchronous GTO, which means that its apogee with be above the GEO belt (35,786 km).
This allows for the spacecraft to burn less on-board fuel to raise its orbit to the GEO belt since less delta-V is needed; the amount of dV needed to take a spacecraft from its GTO to GEO is given in the GTO number: for example, on the Galaxy 31 & 32 mission, the satellites were placed into GTO-1611, which means it needs 1,611 m/s of dV to reach GEO.
Following deployment from the second stage, the satellite will spend the coming months raising its orbit to an operational orbit in geostationary Earth orbit (GEO). EUTELSAT 10B is expected to be operational by February 2023.
It will launch Monday, November 22, 2022 at 21:57 EST, from SLC-40. EUTELSAT 10B first stage booster B1049-11 will deliberately be expended to give its payload a maximum of delta v before stage separation.
The first stage booster, B1049, since its last flight donated its interstage to B1052 (which was converted from a Falcon Heavy minus-Y side core to a regular Falcon 9). B1052 has since that conversion completed five flights as a single stick Falcon 9.
Being in storage missing an interstage, SpaceX decided to put an old Falcon 9 v1.2 Full Thrust interstage on the B1049 booster, which is white. For this reason, this will be the first (and possibly only) Falcon 9 Block 5 launch with a white interstage.
The interstage mounting hardware was changed between older block 5 boosters (boosters before B1056) and newer block 5 boosters. The newer interstage design features a saddle ring with 60% fewer pins (two pins in, three pins out) holding the interstage on, reducing the amount of work needed to remove or replace the Falcon 9’s interstage.
B1067 Interstage connection with Bear Claws attached. Note the pins. Credit: @JerryPikePhoto
About 140-150 pins secures the interstage to the first stage booster in the old design and now there is only use for 56-60 pins in the new design. I take it that there is a similar need to use 56-60 pins to secure the side booster aerodynamic cone.
B1049 will, due to the booster being expended, fly ‘bareback’ with its grid fins, landing legs, and RCS thrusters all having been removed.
After boosting the second stage along with its payload towards orbit, the first stage will freefall in a parabolic curve before it crashes into the Atlantic Ocean. Only a few of the old Falcon 9 first stage boosters will be kept in operational rotation to determine the durability of the Falcon 9 Block 5 booster design. 20 flights is the maximum I’m guessing.
SpaceX will also recover both fairing halves in the Atlantic Ocean with the recovery vessel Doug, named after Demo-2 Astronaut Doug Hurley.
B1049-11 will make its eleventh and last flight after launching its next mission:
B1049-11 didn’t perform a static fire test after refurbishment while waiting for an east coast launch out of Cape Canaveral. SpaceX has omitted this safety precaution many times so far. It isn’t required to perform a static fire test on inhouse missions like Starlink as to save time. Only a few other missions have omitted the static fire test.
SpaceX is the first entity ever that recovers and reflies its fairings. After being jettisoned, the two fairing halves will use cold gas thrusters to orientate themselves as they descend through the atmosphere. Once at a lower altitude, they will deploy drogue chutes and later a parafoil to help them glide down to a soft landing for recovery.
Falcon fairings halfs have been recovered and reused since 2019. Improved design changes and overall refurbishment procedures have decreased the effects of water landings and led to an increased recovery rate of fairings.
The fairings are a used pair each from several previous missions with no known joint mission. Both fairings are expected to survive the landing. Active fairings are equipped with four pushrods to separate the two fairing halfs.
Fairings have evenly spaced venting ports that have been redesigned a number of times by having first ten, then eight and now having their venting ports built as close pairs along the fairing edge. This prevents saltwater from the ocean from flooding and sinking the fairing, and makes refurbishment toward the next flight easier.
The Eutelsat Payload
EUTELSAT 10B will carry two multi-beam HTS Ku-band payloads: a high-capacity payload, covering the North Atlantic corridor, Europe, the Mediterranean basin and the Middle East, offering significant throughput in the busiest air and sea traffic zones, and a second payload to extend coverage across the Atlantic Ocean, Africa and the Indian Ocean.
Artist rendering of Eutelsat 10B with deployed solar cells and reflector dishes. Source link
The satellite’s HTS payloads will be able to process more than 50 GHz of bandwidth, offering a throughput of approximately 35 Gbps.The entire satellite payload will be digitally processed, offering capacity allocation flexibility thanks to a digital transparent processor.
The 10° East location that EUTELSAT 10B will occupy has been operated by Eutelsat since 1987 and provides unrivaled coverage in the heart of the European, Middle Eastern and African zones. EUTELSAT 10B will provide airlines with in-flight connectivity services.
EUTELSAT 10B satellite carry two widebeam C- and Ku-band payloads, 12 transponders equivalent to 36 MHz in Ku-band and 20 transponders equivalent to 36 MHz in C-band will ensure continuity of the missions of the EUTELSAT 10A satellite, whose operational life is scheduled to end in 2023.
Because Ariane was grounded the Cargo ship MN Colibri leaving Fos-sur-Mer in France on October 12 with Eutelsat-10B was diverted to Port Canaveral and SpaceX. That didn't happen without a political fallout in Europe.
Eutelsat 10B dishing it out in the test room - Europeans for scale - Credit: Eutelsat source
The Innovative Spacebus NEO use of ion propulsion technology will keep Eutelsat-10B in the correct position while on orbit. The satellite’s onboard ion Hall-effect plasma thruster engine is powerful enough to reach geostationary orbit.
Read about the Hall-effect thruster engine here.
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