Phase System
The AMSAT Phase system describes an amateur satellite based upon its capabilities or mode of operation and roughly parallel the development of amateur satellites.
- Phase 1: No solar cells (battery-powered only), short-lived, technology test-bed. Must be able to orbit to be classified as a satellite.
- Phase 2: Long life using solar cells, communications capabilities, Low Earth Orbit.
- Phase 3: Long life, more powerful communications, telemetry and command systems. Highly elliptical orbit, usually a Molniya orbit; usually the initial orbit is a geostationary transfer orbit, onboard propulsion systems boosting it to its final orbit. Because of the highly elliptical orbit, the satellite remains over an area for long periods of time, allowing amateurs longer contacts through the satellite.
- Phase 4: Amateur satellite in geostationary orbit. Phase 4 amateur satellites have been designed, but not built, though they have received favorable attention.
- Phase 5: Spacecraft capable of lunar or planetary missions.
Read more about this topic: AMSAT
Famous quotes containing the words phase and/or system:
“This is certainly not the place for a discourse about what festivals are for. Discussions on this theme were plentiful during that phase of preparation and on the whole were fruitless. My experience is that discussion is fruitless. What sets forth and demonstrates is the sight of events in action, is living through these events and understanding them.”
—Doris Lessing (b. 1919)
“Human beings are compelled to live within a lie, but they can be compelled to do so only because they are in fact capable of living in this way. Therefore not only does the system alienate humanity, but at the same time alienated humanity supports this system as its own involuntary masterplan, as a degenerate image of its own degeneration, as a record of people’s own failure as individuals.”
—Václav Havel (b. 1936)