DARPA to build satellite repair robot
DARPA has started a new project to develop a robot satellite designed to refuel and repair satellites.
I wonder if this is linked to the satellite refueling demo that has been doing simulations of exactly this kind of repair work on ISS for the past five years.
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DARPA has started a new project to develop a robot satellite designed to refuel and repair satellites.
I wonder if this is linked to the satellite refueling demo that has been doing simulations of exactly this kind of repair work on ISS for the past five years.
Readers!
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black. Your support allows me the freedom and ability to analyze objectively the ongoing renaissance in space, as well as the cultural changes -- for good or ill -- that are happening across America. Fourteen years ago I wrote that SLS and Orion were a bad ideas, a waste of money, would be years behind schedule, and better replaced by commercial private enterprise. Only now does it appear that Washington might finally recognize this reality.
In 2020 when the world panicked over COVID I wrote that the panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Only in the past year have some of our so-called experts in the health field have begun to recognize these facts.
Your help allows me to do this kind of intelligent analysis. I take no advertising or sponsors, so my reporting isn't influenced by donations by established space or drug companies. Instead, I rely entirely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, which gives me the freedom to write what I think, unencumbered by outside influences.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are four ways of doing so:
1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.
2. Patreon: Go to my website there and pick one of five monthly subscription amounts, or by making a one-time donation.
3. A Paypal Donation or subscription:
4. Donate by check, payable to Robert Zimmerman and mailed to
Behind The Black
c/o Robert Zimmerman
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Cortaro, AZ 85652
You can also support me by buying one of my books, as noted in the boxes interspersed throughout the webpage or shown in the menu above.
Satellites need to be standardized to be repaired. The Air Force is probably large enough to create their own standards, hopefully to be followed by others. But then there’s the problem with orbits. Spy satellites use low orbits with high inclinations. It is expensive to move between such orbits. GPS satellites are also out of the market because they have very different inclinations. The market is in geostationary orbit and private companies. A third problem is that the economic lifetime of a satellite might be much shorter than its technical lifetime. It will often be more profitable to launch a new satellite with the latest technology and higher capacity, than to repair or refuel an old one. It is so much cheaper and less risky to launch the extra fuel together with the satellite to begin with, than equipping it for refueling and then launching extra fuel separately and docking and so many things could go wrong.
Pushing failed satellites into a graveyard orbit should be an attractive purpose for an Solar electric ion propelled towing satellite in GEO. Given that there are some “property” laws which require satellites to clear the area when they malfunction or within a certain maximum time or to make place for the highest bidder or however.