67
votes
Is pinging the Moon with a laser as shown on "The Big Bang Theory" possible?
There is a very nice Myth Busters video about bouncing a laser off the Moon linked below.
To answer your question, current work is done with an array of corner cube reflectors on the Moon roughly 50 ...
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43
votes
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Saturn V's external blueprints
Had a bit of a gander at what NASA Technical Report Server and Semantic Scholar had to offer and found a couple things that I reckon might be helpful.
NASA created a 1/10 scale model of the Saturn V ...
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36
votes
Is pinging the Moon with a laser as shown on "The Big Bang Theory" possible?
The University of Texas's McDonald Observatory performs laser measurements of the distance to the Moon using retroreflectors left by the Apollo astronauts.
You can read all about it in the McDonald ...
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29
votes
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Where can I download the Soyuz Crew Operations Manual?
I can't recall where I got them from, so let me just re-host.
Crew-ops manual
Users manual
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28
votes
Saturn V's external blueprints
There's a more detailed profile drawing available for download at the bottom of this Heroic Relics page. Here's a representative slice:
It used to be possible to get an inexpensive print of a cleaned-...
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23
votes
Does anyone recognise this differential equation (from Gravity's Rainbow)?
Schachterle, Lance, and P. K. Aravind. "The three equations in Gravity's Rainbow." Pynchon Notes 46-49 (2000): 157-170.
Journal Link.
"In our view, Pynchon inscribes these equations into ...
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20
votes
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From which NASA publication originates/where can I find a higher resolution version of this SSME flow diagram?
It's on pdf pages 139-141 here: https://gandalfddi.z19.web.core.windows.net/Shuttle/SSME_MPS_Info/KSC-SSME_System_Eng_Handbook.pdf but you'll have to "glue" it together into one drawing. ...
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16
votes
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Delta V required to land and then ascend from the surface of every celestial body
Most search results I get for "solar system delta-v map" includes this information. I quite like this one:
To read out the ascent cost from these maps, you take the single number between ...
13
votes
Does anyone recognise this differential equation (from Gravity's Rainbow)?
Engelhardt, N. & Engelhardt, H., (2018) “The Momentum of Pynchon's Secret Formula: Gravity’s Rainbow’s Second Equation between Archival Sources and Fiction”, Orbit: A Journal of American ...
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13
votes
Accurate map of Ceres
NASA has produced a topographical features map of Ceres, with names for some craters. The map was produced in 2015.
This one has few more details,
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12
votes
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Resources for Rocket Propulsion
A good starting point would be this very site's rather comprehensive reference section, which contains many propulsion references:
Resources and references on the topic of space exploration
If you are ...
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11
votes
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Is there free, accurate and updated data on planetary body positions in the solar system?
For integration into software, I would recommend the SPICE toolkit, available with interfaces for C, Fortran, IDL, and MATLAB, and the many SPK kernels that can be loaded into SPICE containing the ...
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9
votes
Radiation pattern and signal strength of navigation satellite antennas
Exact radiation patterns and gain (you're probably not asking about signal strength since that depends on distance which isn't constant) will vary across all the different GNSS contellations, even ...
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9
votes
Earth to Mars (or reverse) Hohmann transfer orbits for the 21st Century
Graphics showing non-optimal but "close enough" launch opportunities, and their relative cost, are called porkchop plots.
The following example is from On the Nature of Earth-Mars Porkchop ...
9
votes
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Ariane 6 upper stage schematic showing integration of APU
I found a doctoral dissertation that discusses the possibility of increasing the thrust of the two nozzles (TAPUs) of the APU on Ariane 6's upper stage. The drawings in the dissertation when combined ...
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8
votes
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Returning from Space: Re-entry - from which book is this chapter taken?
Simply traveling the URL "upwards" you get this: https://www.faa.gov/about/office_org/headquarters_offices/avs/offices/aam/cami/library/online_libraries/aerospace_medicine/tutorial/
It's an "online ...
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8
votes
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How do I get the Landsat satellite's images of the Earth?
Head over to the USGS website, and find yourself their nifty Earth Explorer webapp. Figure out where & when you want to snag the imagery of (the tools they provide allow you to draw/designate an ...
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8
votes
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Accurate map of Ceres
The USGS Astrogeology Science Center's Astropedia is an excellent source for derived mapping data products (though only 7 Ceres products).
Here is a "Ceres Nomenclature" data product:
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8
votes
Are there any sources with high-confidence state vectors for GRAIL-A?
Partial answer too long for several comments:
tl;dr: The drift you are seeing is just as likely (if not more) to be a difference in your acceleration models as it is an "inaccuracy" (...
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7
votes
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Is this really the logo of the North Korean space program?
Among others, the Wikipedia page cites this CNET article, which in turn links to a copy of the original KCNA statement; this is also linked from the WP page. It's now offline, but here is an archived ...
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7
votes
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Research paper on 'Wait calculation' for interstellar travel
@AnthonyX has found a paper that fits your description, published in JBIS. The paper's citation is:
Kennedy, Andrew. (2006). Interstellar Travel - The Wait Calculation and the Incentive Trap of ...
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7
votes
Did the Apollo program deliberately hire younger and less-experienced engineers and staff?
This question rests on two premises that are both questionable. First, that the early space program's engineers and functionaries were mostly young, and second that this was due to a deliberate ...
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6
votes
Halo vs Lissajous orbit: Which station-keeping strategy to select and when?
The main difference between the two is that halo orbits tend to be much larger and are constricted to one plane. There's a NASA tech doc from 1993 comparing the station keeping costs between the two ...
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6
votes
What is the status of ESA's proposed human mission to the Moon?
I asked Jim Carpenter, lead scientist for ESA on the Luna 27 lander project, about this. He said that although the plans and protocols for Aurora are still in place, it is currently on hold, outside ...
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6
votes
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Ariane 5 performance data for escape missions
The Ariane 5 user manual has the following data:
Using a storable propellant upper stage, through a delayed ignition of this upper stage, Ariane 5, in the A5G version, has demonstrated its ability ...
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6
votes
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Technical historical books covering the Apollo-Saturn program
Chariots for Apollo NASA SP-4205 (1979) By Courtney G. Brooks, James M. Grimwood and Loyd S. Swenson, Jr. (web version) (pdf version)
Moonport NASA SP-4204 (1978) By Charles D. Benson and William ...
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6
votes
How to get started with CubeSats
Personal Suggestion - It's always best to learn by getting your hands dirty and since you are a student, do make an effort to start a Student Satellite Project in your college if it does not already ...
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6
votes
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Nickname and citation for famous, historic three-body spacecraft trajectory design "manual"; something like "DoKaRoMo"?
You are likely looking for "KoLoMaRo".
http://www.cds.caltech.edu/~koon/book/KoLoMaRo_DMissionBk.pdf
Wang Sang Koon, Martin W. Lo, Jerrold E. Marsden and Shane D. Ross "Dynamical ...
6
votes
NASA design handbooks and specifications
A search on NASA NTRS for "design standards" turns up a lot...
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6
votes
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Is there an archive of the Satellite Times magazine from the mid-late 90s?
Is there an archive somewhere online? Maybe PDFs? I have tried browsing the web but with no luck.
https://worldradiohistory.com/Satellite-Times.htm
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Only top scored, non community-wiki answers of a minimum length are eligible