It’s a text book success… :-)

GSAT-12 riding on PSLV-C17

 

ISRO press release states that the LAB has cleared the launch. The countdown began 53 hr before the scheduled launch ! No surprises for such a massive delivery. Let’s wait for the launch - 16:48 hrs (IST)

PSLV the work horse launch vehicle of ISRO was originally designed for, as it’s name suggests Polar Satellites which are generally low weight and put in low earth orbits. It’s 17 continuous successful flights have helped it mature to set Geo-Synchronous satellites too. Eagerly waiting for the GSLV to start carrying GSAT & heavier class satellites in future. It had failed last time around, still hunting for the post-mortem report :) Currently we mostly courier our fat satellites to get in orbits using Ariane launchers from Guiana.

Chandrayan-II on track despite crash on Christmas Eve

 

(Source : YouTube)

While I was still waiting to view the complete analysis of the failure last time around (Posted in April - “Cryogenic Cries”), this festive season at the end of the western calendar saw another glitch, this time in the first stage which is by far the most proven stage. What’s exciting to read in this article is that a 4 plus or minus degree of tilting due to unknown reasons is actually controllable.

ISRO chief U R Rao’s words confirm our moon commitments though.

Cryogenic cries !!!

The maiden flight of GSLV used an indigenous Cryogenic Engine. A first fully integrated field test for the engine. Once an intellectual mind of the scientist gets a set-back in the experiments he is charged 200% to deal with the gaps in the combination of the input ingredients. There is no look-back only the required level of post-mortem. The sensors must have actively collected the live data. It will be analyzed in detail, and a test routine probably added to the checklist to ensure the reason of dysfunction is permanently avoided. The incident gives if analyzed effectively would bring in innovation that takes the Quality paradigm in Space Research itself to a new level.

All the very best to the Cryogenic Team. The Cyrogenic incident(which is not yet fully analyzed) of yesterday signifies to me the the cries of the Infant. He’s born and now needs food to develop his brain and brawn.

The qualified analysis of the incident are what we should look forth to learn from. It would be great if ISRO could publish the methodology in which the country’s top minds crack this one. Many industries will learn from it. History doesn’t need to be repeated always, it’s learnings are to be turned into stepping stones.

Solar Car - NLV Quant

 

The machine - http://www.nlv-quant.com/     The makers - http://www.nlv-solar.com/

 

Salient points :

Technology - The car is covered with a thin film of photo-voltaic cells with an average photovoltaic conversion efficiency of 38%, depending on ambient conditions, and a peak performance of over 50%. Further it claims that the projected degradation coefficient is only 5–6% over 20 years.

Speed - 0–100 km/h in 2.8 seconds and hit a top speed of 377 km/h

New York Times speaks on it here.

PS : In the early scripts for Quant, didn’t we surely read that on a substantial exposure to good Sun-Light, the batteries get charged fully in as short as 15 mins to be ready for a non-stop 500 km drive. Further you keep charging on the way. Didn’t get to read such a claim once again. Was it a hallucination that caught us on to this fabulous Quant or should we blame it to marketing going over-board?

GSLV Mark III

The GSLV Mark III launch in 2011 pushes ISRO fully to be self reliant in launching heavier communication satellites of INSAT-4 class, which weigh 4.5 to 5 Tonne into Geosyncronous Transfer Orbit (GTO)

Apple unveils iPad…my my…

 

My colleague Jenny just posted me on Apple’s new Avatar, the iPad which is a logical sequel to it’s iPod & iPhone.

http://www.apple.com/ipad/features/

Watch the iPad video here.

• Unbelievable pricing starting as low as $499 (~INR 23k) for 16GB
• Battery life of 10 hrs

Mac Air is more powerful but this should be alright for home usage.

Blogging from my BB 8520

The blogger app for BB 8520 is unfortunately tied up with the service provider. I found an app for MySpace but no free one for blogger though. Hope to see the cool Windows Live writer ref by Vinil, for this BB soon.

Upgraded my BB

 

Upgraded to BB 8520. Steps to get set :

1. Call up 55666 to switch my device & enable it for corporate emails & other configurations. They asked me to switch off the device, remove the sim and place it back.

2. Install s/w with the device and synchronize with my Outlook for contacts/notes/tasks. My earlier BB was already synched with my Outlook.

Cost : ~14k on ebay.in (My dear colleague Amar bought it for me using an ebay coupon which got down the price to 13k for me :)

Next Steps :

0. Getting used to the trackpad after years of using the trackwheel.

1. Called my wife to check if she can hear me on this new device :)

2. Copied A.R. Rehman’s Devotional songs on the 2GB memory card that comes free with this one.

3. Downloaded Google App World to get hold of GMAIL & Google Maps apps.

4. Searching for a nice Blog writer app…

5. Searching for a short-cut to ‘Activate Speaker Phone’…

6. It doesn’t have a built-in GPS, but I should be able to hook it to VM’s GPS receiver over bluetooth. Need to try this :)

http://www.blackberrycool.com/2009/07/27/blackberry-curve-8520-talking-points-trackpad-flash-and-keys/