SuitSat

SuitSat-1 , also called RadioSkaf (in Russian Радиоскаф ), is an Artificial satellite original, put into orbit around the Ground starting from the International space station the February 3rd 2006. It acts in fact of old a Russian Spacesuit Orlan, equipped with batteries, a various broadcasting transmitter and Capteur S.

History of the SuitSat project

The SuitSat project was initiated by association ARISS ( Amateur Radio operator one the International Space Station ), who gathers many associations Radioamateur S throughout the world. It is more precisely the team of ARISS- Russia which imagined the project, with an aim of commemorating the 175e birthday of the Technical Université of State of Moscow, from which are resulting from many engineers of the Russian space agency.

Presented at the time of the International Conference AMSAT ( Radio operator Satellite Amateur Corporation ) to Dayton in October 2004, the project received the support of the the United States.

SuitSat-1

SuitSat-1 evolves/moves on the same orbit as the International space station (ISS). It has sensors measuring the temperature and the power of its batteries, and transmits uninterrupted to the Earth its parameters, and the following message: “ This is SuitSat-1, RS0RS ”, followed of a greeting message in five languages. SuitSat-1, the scientists of NASA take into account to analyze the conditions and the lifespan of the combination and its instrumentation in orbit around the Earth, and exposed to the Sun like with the space Débris; in optics, perhaps, to re-use old spacesuits to make artificial satellites of them.

The artificial satellite started to roughly emit 15 minutes after its placing in orbit. Its signal is relayed by the ISS for the transmission on Earth. It can be collected starting from a point of the ground throughout one 5 to 10 minutes - the time of overflight of SuitSat to the top of this point - by using a Radio FM with large a antenna regulated on the frequency 145,990 MHz. Each person receiving the transmission could announce it about the site of the project, by specifying the date of the observation and what he heard.

However, the SuitSat-1 mission was not a total success. A few hundreds of reports/ratios confirmed the reception of the signal, but the satellite ceased emitting at the end of two weeks. NASA TV announced that SuitSat-1 ceased functioning because of a failure of its batteries. The last reception of the signal of SuitSat-1 took place the February 18th 2006.

SuitSat-1 will end up entering gradually the Terrestrial atmosphere, while evolving/moving in Spirale S, and S will disintegrate a few months there later.

SuitSat-1 is called “Mr. Smith” and “Ivan Ivanovich” (name of the mannequin used to test the capsules Vostok).

Sources

the site of the project: suitsat.org
Advertisement of NASA
detailed Article written by AMSAT
Communicated ARRIS-France (pdf)
AJ3U.com: Audio recordings of SuitSat

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