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NASA Goes Bargain Basement With New Satellite
coondoggie writes to tell us that NASA has announced a new low-cost satellite that could be ideal for those who wish to get into space quickly and (relatively) inexpensively. "The Fast, Affordable, Science and Technology SATellite (FASTSAT) is 39.5 inches in diameter — not much larger than an exercise ball. It is hexagonally shaped and clocks in at a little less than 200 Lbs. It can carry a payload up to 110 Lbs. [...] NASA said FASTSAT is just the right size for earth observing missions, space science missions, and technology demonstrations. 'We think we can do whole missions for less than $10 million instead of the traditional $100s of millions, and that includes the launch vehicle, the satellite, and the widget you want to test,' said Marshall Space Flight Center's Edward 'Sandy' Montgomery in a release."
It'll be interesting to see if this drives a trend towards smaller, COTS parts for these satellites. Personally, I'm excited about this. This could be the first step towards an all-in-one probe (a la Star Trek) like device.
'Loose' is when your pants are three sizes too big. 'Lose' is when you misuse 'loose'.
Data costs tend to be almost as much as the actual hardware since there are only a few locations that are prime for beaming data down - and they're in Alaska or the far North.
Surrey Satellites/University of Surrey in the UK have been making micro sats for decades. (customers include Department of Defence, Banking consortia, ESA, etc etc)
Their second satellite UoSat-2 was build in less 11 months, and they're more than happy to take commercial orders for satellites costing way less than 4 million dollars and still they can make a profit on it, launch included!
Heck this micro satellite isn't even small by today's standards! Give it a couple of years and we'll see satellites that are the size of a large coffee cup. How do I know? My colleagues are building them!