Interstellar spacecrafts.

Sandhi Yudha

Well-Known Member
There are five artificial objects/space probes to achieve the escape velocity needed to leave the Solar System. In sequence of launchdate: Pioneer 10, Pioneer 11, Voyager 1, Voyager 2 and New Horizons.

The outer boundary of the heliosphere, the heliopause, is the point at which the solar wind finally terminates and is the beginning of interstellar space. Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 passed the termination shock and entered the heliosheath at 94 and 84 AU from the Sun, respectively. Voyager 1 was reported to have crossed the heliopause in August 2012, and Voyager 2 in December 2018.

Voyager 1's extended mission is expected to continue until about 2025, when its radioisotope thermoelectric generators (RTGs) will no longer supply enough electric power to operate its scientific instruments.

Provided Voyager 1 does not collide with anything and is not retrieved, the New Horizons space probe will never pass it, despite being launched from Earth at a higher speed than either Voyager spacecraft. The Voyager spacecraft benefited from multiple planetary flybys to increase its heliocentric velocities, whereas New Horizons received only a single such boost, from its Jupiter flyby. As of 2018, New Horizons is traveling at about 14 km/s (8.7 mi/s), 3 km/s (1.9 mi/s) slower than Voyager 1.



Last year Voyager 1 started to register a monotone hum, which was scientifically explainable.


But recently Voyager 1 started to send strange signals to Earth. For an as yet unknown reason, data received from the system doesn't seem to match up with what’s actually happening onboard.


There are maybe some Defencetalk-members who are fan of Startrek and fantasizing about V'ger, but no, that was actually Voyager 6.
 
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ngatimozart

Super Moderator
Staff member
Verified Defense Pro
There are five artificial objects/space probes to achieve the escape velocity needed to leave the Solar System. In sequence of launchdate: Pioneer 10, Pioneer 11, Voyager 1, Voyager 2 and New Horizons.

The outer boundary of the heliosphere, the heliopause, is the point at which the solar wind finally terminates and is the beginning of interstellar space. Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 passed the termination shock and entered the heliosheath at 94 and 84 AU from the Sun, respectively. Voyager 1 was reported to have crossed the heliopause in August 2012, and Voyager 2 in December 2018.

Voyager 1's extended mission is expected to continue until about 2025, when its radioisotope thermoelectric generators (RTGs) will no longer supply enough electric power to operate its scientific instruments.

Provided Voyager 1 does not collide with anything and is not retrieved, the New Horizons space probe will never pass it, despite being launched from Earth at a higher speed than either Voyager spacecraft. The Voyager spacecraft benefited from multiple planetary flybys to increase its heliocentric velocities, whereas New Horizons received only a single such boost, from its Jupiter flyby. As of 2018, New Horizons is traveling at about 14 km/s (8.7 mi/s), 3 km/s (1.9 mi/s) slower than Voyager 1.

Last year Voyager 1 started to register a monotone hum, which was scientifically explainable.

But recently Voyager 1 started to send strange signals to Earth. For an as yet unknown reason, data received from the system doesn't seem to match up with what’s actually happening onboard.

It's all very interesting and something that I have been interested in for decades. Unfortunately I haven't followed it enough in recent times to keep current. I shall have to rectify that. The reason for the data anomaly could be something quite simple actually and that would be the place to start, as against looking for something complicated and / or exotic.
There are maybe some Defencetalk-members who are fan of Startrek and fantasizing about V'ger, but no, that was actually Voyager 6.
Ahem it's the Borg. Must be a Borg Cube floating around out there.
 

Sandhi Yudha

Well-Known Member
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  • #3
For many months Voyager 1 was sending gibberish not-understandable data, but for the moment, Voyager 1 is sending back only health data about its onboard systems. The next step is to enable the spacecraft to begin returning science data again.


 
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Sandhi Yudha

Well-Known Member
  • Thread Starter Thread Starter
  • #4
Because of a technical malfunction on board Voyager 1, NASA wasn't able to contact/communicate with the 47 years old spacecraft for several days. NASA has managed now to reactivate a radiosystem on board the Voyager 1 which wasn't in use since 1981.

The spaceprobe was launched in 1977 and is now at a distance of 24 billion km from Earth, which is almost 80 Astronomical Units.
 
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