Month: April 2017

Cassini to perform final series of daring maneuvers
News, Space flight

Cassini to perform final series of daring maneuvers

The Cassini spacecraft, part of the international Cassini-Huygens mission, is due to start a series of 22 orbits in between Saturn and its rings today, the 26th of April. The ring plane passages pose the final challenge of the mission: having orbited the planet for the last 12 years the spacecraft is set to enter Saturn’s atmosphere on September 15th. The data gathered in the revolutionary maneuvers are expected to further expand our understanding of the Saturnian environment and the origin of the planet and its rings and moons. Already in 2005 the Huygens probe touched down on the Saturnian moon Titan, which has lead to the insight into its many atmospheric and internal processes. From the combination of the in-situ data recovered by the Huygens probe and remote observations performed...
ExoMars: Journey of the Unknown
Space engineering, Space flight

ExoMars: Journey of the Unknown

Author: Nora Sulaikha, Editor at Leonardo Times, TU Delft Article published in Leonardo Times Magazine, Edition of January 2017.  Space exploration may be considered a relatively new venture, having gone into full speed only a little over fifty years ago. However, the knowledge that a great unknown existed outside of what human beings can see with their bare eyes is timeless. From our small world, we have gazed upon the cosmic oceans for untold centuries. In 750 BC, the Babylonians invented the first ever almanac-tables that charted the movements of the Sun, the Moon, and other planets. Science flourished during the renaissance, and in the 17th century, astronomers pointed a new device called the “telescope” at the heavens and made discoveries that made them realize we were all ...
Printed titanium parts to reduce costs on the Dreamliner
Aviation, Manufacturing, News

Printed titanium parts to reduce costs on the Dreamliner

Norsk Titanium AS, a Norwegian 3D printing company, has been hired by Boeing Co. to 3D print structural titanium parts for its Dreamliner. Titanium parts alone cost about $17 million out of the total $265 million cost of the plane. This is due to the 787’s carbon fiber fuselage and wings and result in a higher titanium requirement. This is obviously a sizeable portion of the costs and Boeing has been looking for ways to reduce these costs. Norsk Titanium Vice President, Chip Yates, claims that by 3D printing these, as opposed to manufacturing them the traditional way (with forging and machining), they will be able to cut down the costs of each 787 Dreamliner by around $2-3 million. Considering that Boeing produces around 144 Dreamliners each year on average, this will lead to a sizeable...
The Airbus Zephyr
Aviation, Propulsion, Space engineering, Space flight

The Airbus Zephyr

Authors: Rens van der Zwaard & Max Aalberse, MSc Students Aerospace Engineering, TU Delft Article published in Leonardo Times Magazine, Edition of January 2017.  The Zephyr 8 is a compromise between Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) and satellites. It has the ability to fly autonomously in the stratosphere, above all weather and air traffic, the advantage being that it can perform its functions without having to take unexpected weather changes into account. Its endurance at this altitude is in the order of weeks. Therefore, the Zephyr can do the job of a satellite while flying sufficiently close to the surface to make high-resolution images and is inexpensive to use, relative to developing and launching a satellite. Another advantage is that the Zephyr can always stay focused on th...
SpaceX relaunches a used rocket making history
News, Space engineering, Space flight

SpaceX relaunches a used rocket making history

On March 30, 2017, SpaceX made spaceflight history by reusing a rocket that was used for a previous launch. Their Falcon-9 rocket that was previously used for a mission eleven months earlier, was used to launch the SES-10 satellite. This satellite is intended to provide TV, internet, telephone and radio coverage for South America. The rocket, once launched at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida, deployed its payload successfully about half an hour later. Following this, it was autonomously guided back to a droneship called “Of Course I Still Love You” that was stationed in the Atlantic and landed safely. SpaceX has been on the path toward using reusable rockets and this launch marked a milestone for them. In the past year, they have managed to recover the first stage of nine o...