Thursday, May 23, 2024

Psyche's thruster

Zimmerman is checking in on the Psyche mission. Last time this blog checked, it was for communications; now let's return to thrust. Now being thrusted.

It's ... not a lot of thrust. But what this li'l wonder does have, is specific-impulse. The ejected mass is going out hot enough that the mass-ratio isn't bad; so, delta-V (over time) is high-enough to get to Mars. Actually to a perihelion maybe 1 AU beyond Mars, after which it "falls" to Mars. Not Hohmann in the slightest.

Once at Mars, the craft will do a flyby to take additional thrust from the planet; a classic Space Age manoevre. Then the engine starts up again, to intercept this asteroid 16 Psyche at 3.1 AU; so, that's also not a Hohmann.

The electric-energy to burn the propellant is solar. Which isn't much at Mars and beyond.

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