GUN LAUNCH SYSTEM FOR SMALL SATELLITES: A FRESH LOOK
Bibliographic record
Abstract
The concept of launching small satellites to low earth orbits by means of standard gun is called to be fully implemented, for the first time since it was formulated. For this purpose, it is proposed to use the original Gun Launch System (GLS) being developed by several Ukrainian high-tech companies. This system is able to deliver the payloads weighing up to 5-7 kg to the altitudes of up to 100 kilometres. It is shown that the system, after proper modernisation, will be ideally suited for launching nanoand picosatellites, and have multiple advantages as compared to the conventional launch systems, as well as alternative NanoSat launchers being developed elsewhere. The program of the existing GLS improvement, testing and adaptation to launching satellites in question has been elaborated. 1. BRIEF PRE-HISTORY The idea of launching small satellites to low earth orbits by means of standard gun was born back in the middle of the XX century. It was the HARP orbital program jointly financed by the Canadian and US governments in 1964-1967, that could be considered as a forerunner of the proposed approach. The ultimate goal of the HARP program was Martlet 4 – a full-bore, multi-stage, gun-launchable rocket. The original Martlet 4 parameters called for a vehicle with three solid stages able to launch a payload between 25 and 50 pounds into low earth orbit from the 16 inch L86 gun on the Barbados flight range with an all up shot weight on the order of 2000 pounds. Development trials for the Martlet 4 began in the fall of 1966 with tests proceeding into early 1967. The majority of the early work was conducted on the Highwater, Quebec test range where the structural integrity of the Martlet 4 first stage motor during gun-launching was proven. Due to a series of obstacles, different in nature, the HARP was cancelled in the middle of 1967. It was not able to successfully gun-launch a satellite, although it proved the feasibility of a low-cost, gun-launched satellite system [1]. 2. THE PROPOSED SYSTEM Today there are good chances to prove viability and multiple advantages of the GLS as compared to the conventional launch systems, proceeding from the latest achievements in the field of micro-miniaturisation, nanotechnology, instrumentation and control of the satellites, as well as from advanced launcher technologies. As a first step on this way, it is proposed to make demonstrations to the expert community of how the original GLS being developed by several Ukrainian high-tech companies works. The core of the system is a reusable sub-orbital launch vehicle (RSLV) equipped with the solid/combustion ram-jet engine, control and recovery systems (see figure below). Its length is 120 to 150 centimetres, diameter – 150 or 203 millimetres (NATO Standard gun calibre adaptation is foreseen), weight – 30 kilograms. The rocket projectile initial speed is 965 meters per second.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.000 | 0.001 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.001 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.002 | 0.004 |
| Open science | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Research integrity | 0.001 | 0.002 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.011 | 0.003 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".