.Rocket Lab engineers will have to wait another ~3 months before sending a command to the #spacecraft to circularize its orbit. Then the spacecraft will collect & transmit scientific data back to Earth for ~11 mo. It’s up to @BlueOrigin to determine the exact #LaunchWindow...
.Rocket Lab engineers also designed the #spacecraft so that all the components that tend to get hot are near one deck of the spacecraft, while all the components that get cold are near the other. Thus, the spacecraft will need less power, smaller solar panels, fewer heaters, etc.
These constraints pushed Rocket Lab to innovate. Instead of a box, the two #spacecraft are basically “tank sandwiches.” Typically, the primary structure of a satellite accounts for ~20-22% of its total mass; on #ESCAPADE, thanks to the sandwich design, that number is just 12%.
.Rocket Lab engineers made an enormous effort “so that the launch vehicle was not [a] driving constraint.” Instead, they based much of the #spacecraft design on another variable: max amount of mass the spacecraft can take through a critical maneuver: Mars orbital insertion (MOI).
