Echostar 14 update

[mike123abc]

Their grant is dated 11/29/2006 with provison construction of first satellite must be complete with in 4 years or before 11/29/2010. Else they lose their US license.

http://licensing.fcc.gov/myibfs/download.do?attachment_key=537153

Given that is just 10.5 months away, the satellite specs should be finalized and coordination with Dish and DIRECTV should be able to be made... Somehow I have a feeling that there still are no specs, no way to coordinate, just a stall tactic. Perhaps they do (as mentioned above) want to be bought out or bribed. Dish wanted that 104.5 slot for a long time. S5 should be able to precisely show the interference and problems if they have their satellite plan done and it is entering the final stages of construction. This is not something that is going to be slapped together the night before.

 

[nelson61]

ILS anticipates mid march

ILS spokesman says E14 is on schedule for mid march.

Spaceflight Now | Breaking News | Proton sends broadcasting satellite to space for Intelsat

 

[rocatman]

ILS spokesman says E14 is on schedule for mid march.

Spaceflight Now | Breaking News | Proton sends broadcasting satellite to space for Intelsat

The statement from ILS regarding the number of Proton launches this year is encouraging for getting the E-15 satellite launched in 2010. It certainly would be great to be talking about what Dish is doing with the on-orbit and operational E-15 satellite at 61.5 W one year from now.

 

[HDRoberts]

McKenna said ILS plans eight commercial Proton flights in 2010, plus four or five missions for the Russian government. There may be room for another one or two launches this year, according to McKenna.

From the wonderful Anik at nasaspaceflight, planned Proton launches this year.

January 28 – Raduga-1M (Globus-1M) - Government
February 12 – Intelsat 16 - 1st commercial
middle of March – EchoStar 14 -2nd commercial
Spring - SES-1 - 3rd commercial
beginning of May (TBD) – BADR-5 - 4th commercial
second/third quarter – XM-5 - 5th commercial
August-October – SkyTerra 1 - 6th commercial
fourth quarter (TBD) – KA-SAT - 7th commercial
end of year – EchoStar 15 - 8th commercial
TBD – Kosmos (Garpun) - Government

Proton with non-Briz upper stage
March 2 – three Kosmos (Glonass-M) satellites - Government
August – three Kosmos (Glonass-M) satellites - Government
October 30 – three Kosmos (two Glonass-M and one Glonass-K) satellites - Government

I see 8 commercial and 5 government.

Now if only Quetzsat 1 could finish 7 or so months early and also get up this year.

 

[rocatman]

From the wonderful Anik at nasaspaceflight, planned Proton launches this year.

January 28 – Raduga-1M (Globus-1M) - Government
February 12 – Intelsat 16 - 1st commercial
middle of March – EchoStar 14 -2nd commercial
Spring - SES-1 - 3rd commercial
beginning of May (TBD) – BADR-5 - 4th commercial
second/third quarter – XM-5 - 5th commercial
August-October – SkyTerra 1 - 6th commercial
fourth quarter (TBD) – KA-SAT - 7th commercial
end of year – EchoStar 15 - 8th commercial
TBD – Kosmos (Garpun) - Government

Proton with non-Briz upper stage
March 2 – three Kosmos (Glonass-M) satellites - Government
August – three Kosmos (Glonass-M) satellites - Government
October 30 – three Kosmos (two Glonass-M and one Glonass-K) satellites - Government

I see 8 commercial and 5 government.

Now if only Quetzsat 1 could finish 7 or so months early and also get up this year.

Thanks for the consolidated listing of Proton launches for 2010. I think finishing QuetzSat-1 early is wishful thinking especially when they came out with a specific launch date a few months back i.e., August 4, 2011 and usually satellite launches slip to later dates. It is also pretty obvious that QuetzSat-1 will be a massive spotbeam satellite, at least for the 24 TP portion serving the U.S. and spotbeam satellites are more complicated/take longer to build.

Now for some E-15 satellite speculation. As someone noted, E-15 will be probably be similar to the Ciel-2 satellite with at least 16 TPs dedicated to spotbeams although it will probably have the capability to transmit on all 32 TPs with CONUS signals. I would expect that all the even TPs will be for spotbeams (except for perhaps TP 24) to compliment the spotbeam capability of E-12 which only has the capability to transmit on odd TPs except TP 24. Some folks might question why there is such a large need for spotbeams versus CONUS beams but if one does the math, the need for CONUS TPs is greatly reduced when using MPEG-4. For example when Dish gets use of all 32 TPs at 72.7 W, they could dedicate 28 of them for HD channels which would allow them to put 188 HD channels with 7 channels/TP and have 4 TPs of SD programming having anywhere from 80 to 120 SD channels with 20 - 30 SD channels per TP. This should be plenty of space for CONUS programming especially if Dish starts eliminating the SD duplicate of an HD channel which it could do when subscribers have only HD (MPEG-4) capable receivers.

 

[HDRoberts]

Thanks for the consolidated listing of Proton launches for 2010. I think finishing QuetzSat-1 early is wishful thinking especially when they came out with a specific launch date a few months back i.e., August 4, 2011 and usually satellite launches slip to later dates. It is also pretty obvious that QuetzSat-1 will be a massive spotbeam satellite, at least for the 24 TP portion serving the U.S. and spotbeam satellites are more complicated/take longer to build.

I know. I was joking, hence the smiley.

 

[nelson61]

SpaceflightNow has posted a March 20 launch date for E14

Spaceflight Now | Tracking Station | Worldwide launch schedule

 

[cebbigh]

What's a good guess on when it will go live if all goes well?

 

[nelson61]

What's a good guess on when it will go live if all goes well?

something like 2 months would be a fair guess

 

[nelson61]

Dish files minor amendment incorporating as built tests of antenna cross polar interference. Transponder 21 will only operate in Conus mode to avoid interference with Directv.

FCC INTERNATIONAL BUREAU

 

[rocatman]

Dish files minor amendment incorporating as built tests of antenna cross polar interference. Transponder 21 will only operate in Conus mode to avoid interference with Directv.

FCC INTERNATIONAL BUREAU

I guess Dish learned their lesson from the interference problems they had with DirecTV with the E-10 satellite spotbeams at 110 W.

 

[HDRoberts]

I thought this quote was interesting:

The ECHOSTAR-14 satellite does not use channel 21 for spot beams and therefore there is no impact at all on DIRECTV’s collocated network arising from any below 30 dB XPI performance in some of the ECHOSTAR-14 spot beams. In fact, ECHOSTAR-14 only uses channels 1 to 5 inclusive for spot beams – channels far removed from DIRECTV’s channel 22.

I seem to recall the schedule s saying that transponders 7, 9, 10, 11, and 13 (plus maybe some others) have spot beam capability. But this seems to indicate that only 1-5 will be used at first. My guess, the extra TPs are a backup for E10.

 

[DodgerKing]

something like 2 months would be a fair guess

Why do Dish's birds usually go live much quicker after launch than Direct's birds? It seems like it takes Dish about 1 to 2 months to go live after launch and it takes Direct about 3 to 4 months.

 

[Bradtothebone]

I thought this quote was interesting:



I seem to recall the schedule s saying that transponders 7, 9, 10, 11, and 13 (plus maybe some others) have spot beam capability. But this seems to indicate that only 1-5 will be used at first. My guess, the extra TPs are a backup for E10.

The spotbeam utilization list in the Uplink Report area shows TP's 1-11 and 13 being used for spotbeams. I assume that's from the Schedule S.

 

[HDRoberts]

Why do Dish's birds usually go live much quicker after launch than Direct's birds? It seems like it takes Dish about 1 to 2 months to go live after launch and it takes Direct about 3 to 4 months.

DirecTV's birds are a bit more complected with Ka. Plus, the last 2 have had BSS payloads as well.

 

[nelson61]

ILS activates Echostar 14 Launch Web Site

It's official.

EchoStar XIV Mission Control

 

[Scott Greczkowski]

Yippie!

 

[Fitzie]

It's official.

EchoStar XIV Mission Control

Nelson61, thanks again for your timely info!

That seems to be a heavy satellite.

Fitzie

 

[rocatman]

I thought this quote was interesting:



I seem to recall the schedule s saying that transponders 7, 9, 10, 11, and 13 (plus maybe some others) have spot beam capability. But this seems to indicate that only 1-5 will be used at first. My guess, the extra TPs are a backup for E10.

I am somewhat shocked that Dish would put that type of statement in a FCC filing without any provisions for using the other 7? spotbeam TPs for later use. I can see Dish using only 5 TPs for spotbeams initially until they start the 8PSK conversion for the Western Arc but to put this statement in a FCC filing is really strange. I wouldn't be surprised to see an amendment to this filing in the not too distant future. If I was working this filing at the FCC, I would certainly raise the question about this statement and the rest of the spotbeam capability on E-14.

 

[rocatman]

Nelson61, thanks again for your timely info!

That seems to be a heavy satellite.

Fitzie

E-14 is a very heavy satellite and if you check on the old thread about it in this forum, it was reported that it has a huge amount of propellant compared to other satellites if you can believe the posted numbers. The research I did indicated that it has about 900 kg (~ 2000 lbs.) more propellant than one of the recent DirecTV satellites perhaps D-10. Not sure if the numbers are right and if they are, I have no idea why E-14 would have this much propellant.