Taking Payload Orders!
We have officially begun taking payload slot orders. Payloads are generally sold in 1 kilogram increments at $250 per kilo. For those that want a standardized form factor we are offering CanSat flights. A CanSat is the same size as a standard 12 oz soda can with a mass limit of 350 grams. You can buy kits from various vendors such as Pratt Hobbies. Normally CanSat flights are $199 but for a limited time they are going for an introductory $99.
Remember, this is suborbital only. We won’t be offering orbital payloads for several years and even then they won’t be anywhere near the $199 price.
350 gram CanSat – $99
1 kg Custom Payload – $250
2 kg Custom Payload – $500
5 kg Custom Payload – $1250
Over the next several months we will be releasing versions of the payload manual which includes interface definitions and physical characteristics such as vibration and G loads. Only customers who have signed up will receive these manuals so sign up early!
What will the environmental impact of each flight be? Have you, for example, done a calculation of how much carbon dioxide and/or other gases will be emitted for each kilo of payload put into sub orbit?
Comment by Caspar Henderson — 4/13/2006 @ 5:54 pm
Caspar,
The environmental impact should be quite minimal. Our vehicle is small, and while we plan on flying a lot more than most other suborbital or orbital vehicles, even at that flight rate, it’s pretty much a non-issue. If there ever comes the time that the industry has millions of flights per year, then it might start having a non-negligible impact on the atmosphere, but at this point, even if we were flying the vehicle 24/7 as quick as we could turn it, we’d still not come within even an order of magnitude or two of the amount of CO2 produced by say regional jet travel. As the FAA will quickly point out, for LOX/Hydrocarbon rockets, they’ve always been able to get a “Finding of No Significant Impact” from the EPA.
~Jon
Comment by jongoff — 4/13/2006 @ 8:40 pm
A few questions:
Is the payload recovered? Do I get my can back?
Do you provide power hookups for the can, or do I have to worry about batteries?
Are the cans held inside a container? If so, is there any provision for putting a camera in my can (a viewport, for instance)?
Can I put a radio transmitter in my can? If so, do you impose limits on output, frequency, etc.?
This is a very cool product!
thanks!
Comment by Dave — 4/13/2006 @ 9:09 pm
Dave,
We’ll probably put together some sort of FAQ in the near future, but here’s the answers I can give:
1) At this point all of the payloads are recovered. Ejecting payload at apogee may be possible at some point in the future, but that’ll require extra work with the FAA, so for now we’ll be taking the payloads all the way up, and all the way back down. So yes, you’ll get your can back.
2) We’re still designing the mechanical and electrical interfaces, and things may change as we get details worked out, but current plan is that there will be some sort of data-logging (we’re looking at providing each payload with USB-2.0 connections if they want them) and some sort of power available if the power from the USB isn’t sufficient for a given payload. As of the moment, we’re trying to make sure that each can can have a clear view of the sky, and exposure to vacuum. That may change, but that’s the plan.
3) I’m not sure about the radio frequency stuff yet, but would you still need it if you had a USB connection to an on-vehicle data-logger?
But yeah, as we get questions like this, we’ll try to put together more of a FAQ.
~Jon
Comment by jongoff — 4/13/2006 @ 9:28 pm
Jon,
Thanks! I don’t have a specific application in mind yet, but those were some of the questions that came up as I was mulling options. You’re getting the price low enough that I think you’ll start seeing a lot more people like me- I don’t have any particular need to launch something into space, but if the barriers to entry are low enough I can come up with a fun project.
The point of the radio would be to get real-time data back, so I could watch it as it was happening, and just in case my package fails later in the flight or something goes wrong with recovery. Data logging would help the second case, but not the others.
A clear view and vacuum exposure would be major selling points for me. Do you have any guesstimates for flight time and length of weightlessness / freefall? I realize you’re still working all that out and that full details will be in the integration handbook.
In an age of USB powered coffee warmers, fans, and so on, I’m glad to see there’s a USB 2.0 Space Probe.
thanks,
-Dave
Comment by Dave — 4/14/2006 @ 4:40 pm
Dave,
You’re getting the price low enough that I think you’ll start seeing a lot more people like me- I don’t have any particular need to launch something into space, but if the barriers to entry are low enough I can come up with a fun project.
Yeah, that’s what we’re hoping. Invention can sometimes be the mother of Neccessity.
As for live telemetry and real-time remote control from ground (so you can control an experiment in-flight), that might be something we could provide along with the datalogging. We’ll have to see if we can handle that with the other radio communications we need to do for control and range safety stuff. But I could see why that feature would be useful. Thanks for the suggestion.
As for guestimates on the freefall duration, that will depend a lot on what our maximum altitude is. For XA-1.0, we’re targetting 100km, so that will give something on the order of 2-5 minutes of free-fall on a ~10-15 minute long flight. As we move toward XA-1.5, we’re targetting a lot higher altitude, so the free-fall duration of the flight will go up into the (I think) 5-10 minute range. As we get closer to market, we’ll put together a payload users guide for paying customers, and we’ll probably put some of that info in the public FAQ as well.
~Jon
Comment by jongoff — 4/14/2006 @ 6:46 pm
Hi, Jon,
Would it be possible to sub USB with Ethernet? Especially with Power Over Ethernet capability? You can use an off-the-shelf managed Ethernet switch (http://www.linksys.com/servlet/Satellite?c=L_Product_C2&childpagename=US%2FLayout&cid=1134690842395&pagename=Linksys%2FCommon%2FVisitorWrapper ) to provide both. This way, you can send events/triggers to the payloads (Countdown, Engine Cutoff, Apogee, Landing, or whatever else), and also collect data back. All via very simple HTTP commands, in both directions. This should be well supported by most Linux-based single chip microcontrollers.
Comment by Ben Reytblat — 4/14/2006 @ 7:29 pm
Hi Ben!
We’re going to investigate some of that but we like some of the high bandwidth applications of USB 2.0 for data storage. We’re expecting several of the payload types to want to store image data (telescopes, microscopes, etc) and they all universally use USB to access their high speed storage. Its probably going to have a lot to do with the power requirements and the capabilities of the users and who they get their parts from… But yea, we’re investigating all of that.
-MM
Comment by mmealling — 4/16/2006 @ 9:43 pm
What sort of flight profile are we looking at?
Comment by Andrew Case — 4/16/2006 @ 9:56 pm
Andrew,
What kind of information do you want? The apogee target we’re claiming for XA-1.0 is only a bit over 100km, though that has a bit of margin in it, and XA-1.5 is targetting 250-500km. Peak G’s will likely be on reentry, so I’m not sure if we have a very good handle on what those will be yet. Could be as bad as 3-8G, depending on what altitude, etc. More details will be coming out in the payload users guide and the FAQ. Or you could just corner us at Space Access and pick our brains there.
~Jon
Comment by jongoff — 4/17/2006 @ 4:01 pm
Some thoughts and questions related to this, very energizing prospect.
The choice of power and data bus will dictate some of the potential project details, IMHO, so solidifying what you are and are not providing from a common services standpoint would be helpful.
Also, I would think information about restrictions in terms of payload behavior and vacuum-rating the payloads might be useful. I wouldn’t want “my” payload to be negatively impacted by someone else’s faulting and taking its neighbors out in the process.
I’d love to have triggered events to the payloads (launch, apogee, etc), but can see where you really start getting out of providing a common utility framework and get into a lot of “fiddling”.
What would the timeframe for payload delivery be? One, three or six months prior? How about data recovery and payload recovery? Would payload customers be able to be present at the facility (non-operations area) for launch/recovery (hey, we can dream)?
Will you have requirements on payload motor actions (gyro impacts), radio/wireless frequency use?
If the payload fits within the normalized CanSat profile, outside of mass budget, will there be customization charges for that as well?
Have you folks thought about a common Masten-Space payload users forum? People might want to collaborate on projects. Just a thought.
Looking forward more news, and hoping that Space Access is good this year.
–Dru
Comment by Dru — 4/17/2006 @ 7:50 pm
Jon, Michael, just a little piece of info I thought you might like. It seems like word of your payload offerings spreads well! This morning I picked up a well-read (plm 500000 daily) dutch newspaper. It featured a (short) article ON THE FRONT PAGE about you guys offering CanSats. You can read the paper (well, if your dutch is good enough
at http://www.metronieuws.nl/index.php?actie=krantvanvandaag (free reg required). I haven’t checked, but it might then also be in other editions of Metro (global reach 18.5 million/day!).
Keep up the good work, guys!
Comment by Wouter Vijvers — 4/21/2006 @ 7:26 am
[...] If you don’t think you can make the cut, can’t afford a regular launch (yet), and still want to fly something to space, you might want to consider a CanSat or a PongSat in the meantime. [...]
Pingback by Satellite launches going for free at JAXA - Out of the Cradle — 5/11/2006 @ 1:19 am
Is It possible to put a camera in the can to you can get live feedback from the launch and all the way down to recovery?
Comment by evan — 8/2/2006 @ 9:31 pm
evan,
Probably not live. But you can take video all the way up and back. But here are some gotchas: 1) the payload bay will only open while in space. That means for much of the launch and reentry you will only see the inside of hte payload bay. As a payload customer you do get a DVD of the flight that includes video from on board cameras. Hope that helps!
-MM
Comment by mmealling — 8/3/2006 @ 4:51 pm