- cross-posted to:
- technology@lemmy.world
- cross-posted to:
- technology@lemmy.world
On April 17, engineers at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Southern California sent commands to shut down an instrument aboard Voyager 1 called the Low-energy Charged Particles experiment, or LECP. The nuclear-powered spacecraft is running low on power, and turning off the LECP is considered the best way to keep humanity’s first interstellar explorer going.
…The instrument has provided critical data about the structure of the interstellar medium, detecting pressure fronts and regions of varying particle density in the space beyond our heliosphere. The twin Voyagers are the only spacecraft that are far enough from Earth to provide this information.
…“Voyager 1 still has two remaining operating science instruments — one that listens to plasma waves and one that measures magnetic fields. They are still working great, sending back data from a region of space no other human-made craft has ever explored…
Engineers are confident that shutting down the LECP will give Voyager 1 about a year of breathing room. They are using the time to finalize a more ambitious energy-saving fix for both Voyagers they call “the Big Bang,” which is designed to further extend Voyager operations. The idea is to swap out a group of powered devices all at once — hence the nickname — turning some things off and replacing them with lower-power alternatives to keep the spacecraft warm enough to continue gathering science data.
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It never fails to fill me with absolute respect and awe for the people who build them, that the Voyager probes have gone so far and done so much for so long. It’s remarkable, and inspiring.
And the fact that they not only still work, but were made in such a way that individual instruments could be shut off in order to divert power to others and keep the thing alive for longer is just the icing on the cake. Just incredible.
The Voyagers were the first spacecraft that could be reprogrammed after launch. When they launched the technology to get pictures back from Neptune and Uranus didn’t exist yet nor had the code Voyager needed to do it been written yet.
It’s wild that they were originally built for a five year mission and they’re still ticking almost 50 years later.
Just like Star Trek.
And just like Voyager, Star Trek seems to be shutting off instruments to keep it alive… Wait, NVM they cancelled everything.
conserve energy by shutting off heaters and instruments while making sure the spacecraft don’t get so cold that their fuel lines freeze.
Fuel?! Voyager has fuel?
Well it doesn’t have a tank of gasoline and an engine, if that’s what you mean. I think the article is using simplified language, but yeah if they get too cold then the hydrazine lines for the course adjustment thrusters will freeze up and then the antenna will drift out of alignment with earth and we won’t be able to communicate with it anymore
I knew it had RCS, but I didn’t expect it to still have any juice left. I assumed the antenna was aimed with an electrical tilting base. It’s fixed?
Yep, though it doesn’t have to use much propellant to keep itself oriented as there aren’t really any forces acting on it, so the only thing to correct is whatever rotation was introduced by the last thruster firing. Just a tiny correction once or twice an hour is needed (which seems frequent, but it’s an extremely short firing, in the millisecond range).
Thank you, that was very educational!
Can you imagine what kinda of tech a future Voyager series craft will run on? I get that space is really really big, but I think it’d be pretty neat to have and Interstellar Voyager just over to Alpha Centauri and back. Like we can barely even confirm there are planets in other systems, and we certainly don’t have a clue how common life is or isn’t in the universe. Wouldn’t it be worth, you know, taking a peek at a few local systems, just to check out the neighborhood? Right now, we could have a stone age civilization in the back yard and not even know it.
