On Feb 5, 12:43=A0pm, Robert Martinu <inva...@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
> Russell Wallace schrieb:
> > John Schilling wrote:
> >> There are probably no companies capable of putting a spacecraft in
> >> orbit about Saturn in under ten years.
> > Why not? Didn't Cassini take something like 7 years in flight? That
> > leaves three years to build a small, simple robot spacecraft - not
> > develop from scratch, not invent new technology, but build using
> > existing technology.
> Cassini needed Venus, Earth Jupiter and Saturn to be in the right
> positions, you don't get that every day.
Did it really need it? If your objective is a science mission
on a planet which has already been visited several times,
then you'll be willing to wait some years and play cosmic
billiards to boost your payload. But if you're testing a
revolutionary FTL drive, then maybe you just want to get
the thing out there quickly with a direct route.
Nevertheless, I'd expect this probe would be built using ion
propulsion rather than pure chemical rocket propulsion. Ion
propulsion has reached sufficient maturity.
Isaac Kuo
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