Re: [amsat-bb] AO-40 Spin Analysis

["Alan K. Adamson" <ne1h@xxxxxxxxxx>]

Bob, 

Sure hope you aren't a little premature *demanding* a statement.  Only reason for pause.... Remember the after launch efforts with MT'ing.   They were *very* slow to have any effect.

As I understand it, we have three challenges with expecting big changes from MT.

a) we are still in a GTO orbit and I believe that there is an issues the the lines of magnetism and the influence of MTing on the S/C.  Basically the equatorial orbit slows any effect.

b) if we are still getting a thrust product in a direction opposite the spin, MTing would be slowed by that effort as well

c) both a and b above could mask any significant change and yet a month from now (just using that timeframe to make a point), we *could* see a change.

BTW, all of the above points have been documents and communicated by the command team.  We are expecting big changes from a device that is know to only provide small changes.

I'll offer one other observations.  I suspect that the sun sensors are not very accurate at the moment because of the sun angle, so the art of remote navigation is probably a little hampered.  That changes the closer we get to spring and I'm sure ground controllers are taking that into account.

Just my .02
Alan
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