“Engineers are optimistic they can find a way for the FDS to operate normally.”
“Bad” memory that lasts 45 years in interplanetary space.
#BringVoyagerHome
As soon as we invent FTL I’m sure we will
might want to sit down for this one
Let’s focus on FTV first
This is going to be one tough RMA…
All orbits are elliptical. Eventually, it will.
It’s not in an orbit. Well, it technically is, but it moved far enough away that that orbit no longer intersects with the solar system’s SOI. That was the whole point of the voyager probes, to go out into deep space. That’s why we sent them out with our mix tapes
You’re saying the same thing by a different route. It’s orbit through the galaxy eventually comes back around to us.
Incidently, this is also why we can’t just send nuclear waste on a solar escape trajectory. It eventually comes back.
It won’t have started getting closer again before the Milky Way collides with the Adromeda galaxy in 5 Billion years, so it and anything we send on a similar path isn’t coming back.
Is it in orbit? And more importantly, is it in orbit around us?
It is, but not around us. It doesn’t matter, because that orbit still comes back around.
I would believe that if the universe was not constantly expanding, that would be mathematically true. I’m not mathematician, but I think with a constantly expanding universe, that’s not a mathematical certainty.
As I understand it, expansion doesn’t really affect local systems like galaxies directly/significantly. It’s not really a factor for voyager returning or not.
“Bad memory”. tpsh. That memory exceeded it’s mandate by 41 years. That memory is tired. it needed rest. It’s ready to collect it’s retirement pension.
It still is amazing it lasted a long time.
No worries. That portion of memory only contained the ‘oya’ portion of it’s name. It will continue on, known now as Vger.
RIP. Rest in Interstellar sPace
This is just a diagnosis of the problem.
That thing is engineered so they can bypass or repurpose ever little bit.
Which is probably what they’ll do now, do a software update that will make the system evade the bad memory segment.
Voyager has 3 computers and only 1 is affected.
This is the best summary I could come up with:
Engineers have determined why NASA’s Voyager 1 probe has been transmitting gibberish for nearly five months, raising hopes of recovering humanity’s most distant spacecraft.
The FDS duties include packaging Voyager 1’s science and engineering data for relay to Earth through the craft’s Telemetry Modulation Unit and radio transmitter.
Suzanne Dodd, NASA’s project manager for the twin Voyager probes, told Ars in February that this was one of the most serious problems the mission has ever faced.
Due to the Voyagers’ age, engineers had to reference paper documents, memos, and blueprints to help understand the spacecraft’s design details.
After months of brainstorming and planning, teams at JPL uplinked a command in early March to prompt the spacecraft to send back a readout of the FDS memory.
“The team suspects that a single chip responsible for storing part of the affected portion of the FDS memory isn’t working,” NASA said in an update posted Thursday.
The original article contains 668 words, the summary contains 153 words. Saved 77%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!
Important points missed by the bot:
FDS is the Flight Data Subsystem:
The Flight Data Subsystem was an innovation in computing when it was developed five decades ago. It was the first computer on a spacecraft to use volatile memory. Most of NASA’s missions operate with redundancy, so each Voyager spacecraft launched with two FDS computers. But the backup FDS on Voyager 1 failed in 1982.
They identified the problem:
The command worked, and Voyager.1 responded with a signal different from the code the spacecraft had been transmitting since November. After several weeks of meticulous examination of the new code, engineers pinpointed the locations of the bad memory.
They think they can work around the problem:
“Although it may take weeks or months, engineers are optimistic they can find a way for the FDS to operate normally without the unusable memory hardware, which would enable Voyager 1 to begin returning science and engineering data again,” NASA said.
Most manufacture have a lifetime warranty with their memory sticks.
“Bring it into the shop, we’ll replace the stick for free.”
