XRS-2 News

August 10, 2005: XRS is gone. See the official statement for details. Very sad. The good news is that the remaining instruments (XIS and HXD) are working very well, and will provide lots of great science.
July 27, 2005: First (calibration) light! The ADR has been cycled, and the detectors are cold. The gate valve is still closed, covering the opening where X-rays get in, so we haven't seen any celestial X-rays yet, but the calibration pixel is seeing photons from the internal calibration source. Noise levels have been checked and are as expected. We have an instrument.
July 23, 2005: The orbit circularization is finished. After several days of delta-V operations, Suzaku's orbit now has an apogee of 568 km and an eccentricity of less than 0.0002. 20% of the original fuel supply remains. We have run up to 250 mA of current through the XRS magnet, and operated the heat switch. The heat load on the calorimeter thermal sink is 5 microwatts, the same as measured on the ground. This gives us very high confidence that the full ADR cycle on July 25 will be successful. The particle background detected by the anticoincidence detector is about 1 per second, right in the expected range. Looking good so far!
July 13, 2005: Suzaku has spread its wings and raised its head to look around. (Thanks to Professor Hideyo Kunieda for that beautiful analogy.) In more mundane terms, the solar panels have been deployed and the Extendable Optical Bench has been extended and locked into place. Also, the XRS electronics have been powered on, and all XRS detectors are intact. The XRS particle detector is working properly, and the particle background is as expected. Over the next few days Suzaku's orbit will be circularized by a series of small delta-V maneuvers. Then on or about July 27 we will operate the ADR to cool the detectors to operating temperature. That will allow the detectors to see X-ray photons from space for the first time. (However, it will only see higher energy photons until the vaccuum cover on the dewar is opened a few days later.)
July 10, 2005 16:00 JST: The name of the mission is Suzaku. Suzaku is an Asian god, in the shape of a bird, who was the guardian of the South, and is at least somewhat phoenix-like. Our mission of course is also phoenix-like, having risen five years later from the fiery destruction of Astro-E. Read more about the name.
July 10, 2005 13:20 JST: After the first orbit, we have seen that all dewar temperatures are as expected, and the ACHE is operating normally. So the XRS instrument is in good shape, we're in the right orbit, and attitude is nominal. We've got a bunch of very happy people here!
July 10, 2005 12:40 JST: Data from the tracking station in Santiago confirms that the satellite has separated from the 3rd stage and the perigee raise maneuver was correct. Also, all the correct XRS valves opened at the correct time. We are in a nominal orbit, all systems working perfectly so far.
July 10, 2005 13:30 JST: Astro-E2 is in orbit! Launch was beautiful, at 12:30 JST from Uchinoura Space Center in Uchinoura, Japan. Orbit appears nominal so far.
July 10, 2005 09:20 JST: The big door is open and the rocket is about to be rotated out of the launch tower. We're still GO for launch.
July 10, 2005 08:20 JST: The weather is still holding, with winds under 10 meters/sec (the maximum for launch is 15), and the sky is cloudy but not raining. The short functional has been completed, and the rocket is being set into launch mode.
July 10, 2005 04:00 JST: We're go for launch at 12:30 today. The helium tank is full and cold, the shorting plugs are installed, and the weather looks decent. The team is in the control room under the 34 meter antenna, and the short functional will start at 04:30.
July 9, 2005 09:45 JST: The XRS helium dewar has been filled and topped off, and we got 4% more helium than the first time (corresponding to an additional month or more of lifetime). We are currently pumping on the helium to bring down the temperature further, and will close the vent line valve early this evening. Launch is still on for tomorrow at 12:30 PM JST.
July 8, 2005 09:30 JST: Thunderstorms moved through the area in the early morning hours, requiring the launch tower to be evacuated. However, this hasn't affected the XRS servicing schedule. Today we pump down the helium storage dewar until it becomes superfluid, and refill the XRS helium dewar with that superfluid helium. Tomorrow will be spent pumping on the helium in the XRS dewar to get it as cold as possible.
July 7, 2005 14:00 JST: Launch has been delayed to no earlier than 12:30PM July 10. JST, due to weather. The XRS dewar can only sit for 2 more days without being serviced again, and servicing takes two days, so we will start servicing the dewar now. This will have us ready for a launch on Sunday, July 10.
July 6, 2005 11:10 JST: The decision to scrub has been validated; the launch tower is being evacuated due to approaching thunderstorms.
July 6, 2005 09:30 JST: Scrub! Launch has been scrubbed due to weather. Also, because the weather for tomorrow is predicted to be much worse than today, launch will not be attempted tomorrow. JAXA will decide at 2PM JST tomorrow whether to attempt a launch on Friday. This morning we will remove the cover from the nose fairing access hole and re-attach the XRS temperature monitoring electronics.
July 6, 2005 07:35 JST: The first weather balloon has been launched. It went up for a while, then back down for a few seconds. Wind is still gusting to 15 m/s, apparently very swirly, and the rain varies from none at all to torrential.
July 6, 2005 06:30 JST: The wind is out of the North at 5 to 10 meters/second (10 to 20 knots), which is slower than it was earlier. The limit for launching is 15 m/s, so there is still hope.
July 6, 2005 05:30 JST: XRS has successfully completed its portion of the short functional test. The weather continues to look ugly.
July 6, 2005 04:30 JST: The pre-launch short functional test is underway. Everything is nominal so far (other than the weather). The first GO/NO-GO decision on the weather is about 8:30 our time, before they roll the rocket out of the tower. If the weather stays as it is now, that is unlikely to be a GO.
July 5, 2005 11:00 JST: Launch is still set for tomorrow. We have completed the low-temperature topoff, and the helium dewar is 92.2% full, which is enough to last the full three year lifetime. Now we rest for a while before returning at 8PM to start the final removal of plumbing and electronic cables before launch. There's a nasty occluded front about 50 km to our North, where it's raining like stink, so it's all a question of whether it decides to move our way.
July 4, 2005 12:00 JST: The weather is deteriorating somewhat, but the decision has been made to go ahead with preparations for the launch on July 6, just 48 hours from now. It's quite windy and raining some right now, and there's a large front in the Sea of Japan which is threatening us. However, we press on so that we'll be ready if the weather is.
July 3, 2005 13:00 JST: The weather held, and the rocket was rotated out of the tower, although not all the way to the launch position. Perhaps they wanted to be able to get it back into the tower quickly in case the rain came back. The launch test was successful, so launch is now just a question of the weather in three days.
July 3, 2005 09:00 JST: The launch rehearsal is under way. The weather has been windy and drizzly, but it seems to be clearing up. We don't know yet whether the rocket will be rotated out of the tower into launch position or not. We can continue the rehearsal in either case. The short functional test is complete, and everything is working fine.
July 2, 2005: The plan for the launch rehearsal is coming together. Tomorrow, Launch-3, we get up at midnight to start the rehearsal for launch. First we have to remove the temperature readout wiring and install shorting plugs on the rocket, and cover up the hole in the nose fairing. (We won't actually do these things during the rehearsal.) Then we run the short functional and put the rocket into launch position. Finally the rocket team will verify all the systems are ready for the actual launch at 12:30 PM July 6 (that's 11:30 PM July 5 for those on Eastern Daylight Time).
July 1, 2005: The first launcher test is a success. The launcher was rotated into launch position today (see photo), and everything worked nicely. It's rather scary to see the rocket tilting 12 degrees off vertical, especially underneath the rail like that, but it was fine. There is another launcher test in two days, but if the weather doesn't cooperate we will just skip it. So There's only one more weather-critical day: Launch!
June 27, 2005: At last, our rocket is complete again! The spacecraft and third stage have been moved to the launch tower and integrated with the rest of the rocket. There are two more weather-critical items: Rotating the rocket out of the tower building into launch position for a launch rehearsal (July 1 or 3), and launch! (July 6).
June 24, 2005: The fairing slings have been removed. When the fairing is first attached, it has metal braces to keep the two halves in the correct shape. Once the halves have been connected, it's strong enough to hold itself in the proper shape. There are still some holes for access. They will be covered later.
June 23, 2005: The spacecraft has been enclosed in the nose fairing.
June 2, 2005: The start of the launch window has been pushed back to July 6, in order to allow time to replace the nozzle of the rocket's third stage. The original nozzle has some mechanical parameters that are slightly off-nominal, and the rocket team wants to be 100% sure it will work exactly as planned, so they are swapping in a new nozzle, which pushes back the earliest possible launch by 10 days.
May 31, 2005: The two-day functional test is almost over, and everything went well. We didn't even have any difficulty from the magnitude 5.9 earthquake that happened at 11:04 this morning about 30 kilometers from here!
May 28, 2005: The Goddard team, minus the cryogenic people, is at Uchinoura Space Center (USC). We're preparing for a detailed functional test starting Monday morning. This test will last two days, and will assure us that all instruments survived shipping to the launch site.
May 25, 2005: The first of the GSFC team has arrived at the launch site. Juli is there, setting up our GSE. Gary (systems engineer), Rich (Principal Investigator), and Kevin (launch operations engineer) leave the U.S. tomorrow, arriving at USC on the 29th (yep, it takes 3 days to get there, but one of them is only because we cross the International Date Line).
May 23, 2005: The spacecraft is on its way to the launch site. The official launch window starts on June 26. Most of the GSFC launch team will be flying to Kagoshima this Thursday, for the functional test after the spacecraft arrives.
July 26, 2004: The Extendible Optical Bench on the spacecraft was extended today, and all went well. The EOB allows the spacecraft to be shortened for launch, and extended to the full focal length of the mirrors once on orbit.
July 20, 2004: The insert is pumped out, and has a 20% fill of solid neon. We are taking calibration data until mid-August.
June 13, 2004: The insert is in the neon dewar, and the filters are in place. Now we begin pumping the air out of the dewar's vacuum space. It takes a month to achieve the necessary vacuum level.
March 11, 2004: The insert has shipped! The XRS-2 insert is off to Sumitomo Heavy Industries in Niihama, Japan, to be integrated with the neon dewar. In June we install the aperture cylinder, which contains 4 of the 5 filters that let X-rays through while blocking optical, infrared, and ultraviolet light. Then in July we cool down and start running the detectors.
July 19, 2001: Astro-E2 has been approved! We'll see you in Kagoshima in February 2005 (and at ISAS and SHI and GSFC in the intervening years. Once more, with feeling!

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