Kate in Space

[VernK]

Congratulations to Evolution Space for reaching space with their launch on Saturday, April 22, from the Mojave desert in California. The rocket named Gold Chain Cowboy reached apogee at 408,456 feet AGL. That is 15 miles higher than the Karman line which is the internationally recognized boundary of space. The rocket was a single stage solid propellant full S motor and reached a maximum speed of Mach 5.2. It was 22 feet long, 10" in diameter and weighed 900 pounds on the pad. This makes Evolution Space the 9th privately funded US company to pass the Karman line.

The Multitronix Kate-3 TelemetryPro System was used for all the onboard flight controls, GPS tracking and telemetry downlink. There was a solid telemetry link during the entire flight. The onboard avionics performed flawlessly!

 

[VernK]

Evolution Space has posted a pad cam video of the launch that includes the Kate audio all the way to apogee.

 

[rocket_troy]

Hats off team!

TP

 

[rfjustin]

Evolution Space has posted a pad cam video of the launch that includes the Kate audio all the way to apogee.

Very cool for you and the ES team!

Was the vehicle recovered successfully?

 

[FredA]

Congratulations to all involved! What a great achievement.
Recovered? Sure hope so.........

 

[VernK]

Evolution Space has issued the following statement: "The flight experienced a drogue parachute anomaly that resulted in a higher than expected landing velocity. We have recovered the vehicle hardware and are currently working to recover and process the onboard flight data."

I expect more information will be released as soon as it becomes available.

 

[Worsaer]

Nicely Done! Congrats Vern on Kate's milestone flight.

 

[plugger]

Incredible work all!

 

[FredA]

Sounds like another instance where Kate should have been screaming on the way down to her burial.

 

[OverTheTop]

Great effort from the team, and also for your system Vern. Do you have any numbers on how much link budget was left at that altitude?

 

[stealth6]

sweet.

s6

 

[VernK]

Do you have any numbers on how much link budget was left at that altitude?

Here is a plot of the received signal strength for each downlink packet during the entire flight. Apogee is indicated by the red vertical line. The average level at apogee was running at about -105 dBm. The Kate-3 receiver can work down to about -115 dBm but at that level packet reception can be spotty. I test all receivers to make sure they work reliability at -110 dBm. So there was about 5-10 dB of link margin left at apogee depending on what criteria you want to apply.

 

[OzHybrid]

Sounds like another instance where Kate should have been screaming on the way down to her burial.

@VernK Come on Vern. Give it to us as an option....... Descent velocity voice option 2

 

[StreuB1]

Vern, were you Tx @ 1W and Rx on your standard cross dipole?

 

[VernK]

Vern, were you Tx @ 1W and Rx on your standard cross dipole?

Kate transmits at 100mW on the pad. Then switches to 500mW at liftoff. Then to 1W above 75K feet. Yes, reception was with the standard circularly polarized crossed dipole fixed to the receiver.

 

[StreuB1]

Kate transmits at 100mW on the pad. Then switches to 500mW at liftoff. Then to 1W above 75K feet. Yes, reception was with the standard circularly polarized crossed dipole fixed to the receiver.

0.0000036 VPP (3.6 uV) is pretty good!!

EDIT: microvolt is uV, not mV!!

 

[OverTheTop]

0.0000036 VPP (3.6 mV) is pretty good!!

uV, not mV . I knew what you meant though.

 

[VernK]

0.0000036 VPP (3.6 mV) is pretty good!!

Actually just 3.6 uV.

 

[StreuB1]

mmmmmm....icro

Its 11pm

 

[RocketDestroyer]

Congratulations to Vern, Kate and Evolution.

 

[Hobie1dog]

 

[JackC]

Will Kate join the Space Force after her flight into space?

 

[airforcetp1991]

Great working with you Vern, we couldn’t have done it without you! This is right after Kate said “The Rocket Has Reached Space”

 

[AllDigital]

The gold standard for space shots. Congratulations @VernK

 

[Steve Shannon]

Sounds like another instance where Kate should have been screaming on the way down to her burial.
But in space no one could hear her screams!

 

[VernK]

Evolution Space has posted a new video of the Gold Chain Cowboy launch. Besides the launch itself, this one also shows some of the activity behind the scenes before the launch. Launch operations started at 4:00am for the scheduled 8:00am launch. That's why a lot of the setup was in the dark.

 

[rAUM]

Evolution Space has posted a new video of the Gold Chain Cowboy launch. Besides the launch itself, this one also shows some of the activity behind the scenes before the launch. Launch operations started at 4:00am for the scheduled 8:00am launch. That's why a lot of the setup was in the dark.

Do you guys send to Europe?

 

[VernK]

Do you guys send to Europe?

Sorry, no. The frequency band used by Kate is not legal in Europe. Kate operates in the 902-928 MHz ISM band.

 

[rAUM]

Sorry, no. The frequency band used by Kate is not legal in Europe. Kate operates in the 902-928 MHz ISM band.

So no hope getting to space on this side of the pond? Did you guys try it with a accelerometer and magnetometer?

 

[VernK]

Did you guys try it with a accelerometer and magnetometer?

Kate has an accelerometer, a GPS and a baro pressure sensor for determing altitude. A magnetometer appeared to be too problematic and unreliable so was not designed in.