AMC-15 Now at 136 W

[rocatman]

Lyng Sat satellite tracking is indicating this morning that AMC-15 is now in a geostationary orbit at 136 W. This took longer than expected but now the testing can begin after which it will be moved to 105 W. Hope to see it go operational by January 1, 2005.

 

[dimi1963]

What channel will be delivered by this bird? It will replace an old sat or it will be an extra bird? Hopefully the QP will be alittle better when they will make this AMC-15 operaional...

 

[mkm4]

What channel will be delivered by this bird? It will replace an old sat or it will be an extra bird? Hopefully the QP will be alittle better when they will make this AMC-15 operaional...

It will replace AMC-2 at the 105 slot.

 

[goaliebob99]

i belive its replacing amc2... anyone in the fta section seeing the bird yet? anything on it?? at 136?

 

[Scott Greczkowski]

They can not transmit video to the the bird at 136, at 136 instead tests are being done to make sure everything powers up correctly and replies to commands to the ground. Once that is all tested out then it will be moved to 105 where video can be bounced off of it.

 

[TuxCoder]

They can't just turn an uplink dish over to it? Or is it an FCC thing?

 

[John Kotches]

So how long does it take to move it around in orbit? It's got to move about 1/12th of the way around the globe (about 6000 miles) not counting moving it in and out of the appropriate plane of orbit.

Cheers,

 

[rocatman]

So how long does it take to move it around in orbit? It's got to move about 1/12th of the way around the globe (about 6000 miles) not counting moving it in and out of the appropriate plane of orbit.

Cheers,

The hard part was circularizing the orbit/getting the satellite inclination to basically zero. The move from 136 W to 105 W should not take that long perhaps a day or two at most.

 

[goaliebob99]

you would think they could... no telling about the fcc expecally after the way howerd sturn bashed them..

 

[JohnH]

They can't just turn an uplink dish over to it? Or is it an FCC thing?

FCC thing. No programming is allowed to be delivered from a test only location.

 

[gpflepsen]

So how long does it take to move it around in orbit? It's got to move about 1/12th of the way around the globe (about 6000 miles) not counting moving it in and out of the appropriate plane of orbit.

Cheers,

About 14000 miles. At geostationary orbit, each degree of separation is about 450 miles. At 200 mph, they can get there in about 70 hrs. I don't know how fast they let them move across the sky.

 

[John Kotches]

Gerry:

I did circumference as Pi * Radius, instead of Pi * Diameter. DOh!

Cheers,

 

[TuxCoder]

FCC thing. No programming is allowed to be delivered from a test only location.

Darn.
I wouldn't necessarily count something like this as 'programming' though:

After I asked above about an uplink dish, I realized, that would probably be how they are testing the communications as Scott mentioned above, and thus would already have an uplink dish facing 136.

 

[gpflepsen]

Gerry:

I did circumference as Pi * Radius, instead of Pi * Diameter. DOh!

Cheers,

I didn't even look at your number, I figured you were looking at the distance over ground.

pi r^2... area

2pi r... distance

4/3 pi r^3 volume ??? My memory may be failing me now