262 Voyager
This comic goes out to Kickstarter supporter Lisandro.
And you know the coolest part? Interstellar space sounds exactly like you think it would:
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↓ Transcript
ROB
This is cool, you can hear the sound from voyager as it leaves the solar system.
LISANDRO
Wow, that's the sound of the galaxy? I hate to think that aliens somewhere might be really similar to us, -but we'll be long extinct before we ever meet them.
This is cool, you can hear the sound from voyager as it leaves the solar system.
LISANDRO
Wow, that's the sound of the galaxy? I hate to think that aliens somewhere might be really similar to us, -but we'll be long extinct before we ever meet them.
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That reminds me a bit of whalesong. Or maybe I’ve just seen Star Trek IV too many times.
You can hear the sound of Voyager? I thought in space, no one can hear you scream. Maybe if it isn’t screaming, you can hear it? As it is, it sounds to me like the kettle’s boiled, so at least aliens are civilised enough to make a cup of tea before they eat you.
Kinda sounds like screaming, but thanks to Ridley Scott we all know that can’t be.
My uncle designed part of the telemetry receiver for Voyager. The following is an email he sent me some years back as well as some pictures.
http://imgur.com/a/AyWLH
Casey,
I thought you might be interested to see what I designed back in
1978 when I worked at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (NASA) in Pasadena.
It was a wide-band-data-synchronizer for preprocessing the Voyager
Spacecraft imaging data in the real-time image processing center of the
Space Flight Operations Facility. (Both of the Voyager Spacecraft on their
primary mission and first encounter.)
I designed these units and coordinated the building, installation, and checkout
of these units in the Voyager spacecraft imaging processing center.
All of the Voyager imaging data went through these units before going to the
imaging area computers for processing.
The purpose of these units was to preprocess the data stream and add header
data words to blocks of data to indicate to the computers where the start of
image data was located in the data stream. This reduced the computing load
of the software in the computers and more computing time could then be available
and dedicated to processing the images in real time.
Additionally,
I designed and incorporated circuitry to duplicate the function performed by the
communication systems equipment in the basement of the building to locate and
lock onto the data stream in order to create the proper blocks of data.
This was called “freelock” and a front panel indicator showed this condition.
( All of the indicators on the front panel were red LED lights.)
And, there was a time that the equipment in the basement was faulty and they
did not know it down there until the imaging area personnel contacted them and
told them that they were not sending the block synchronizing signal upstairs to
the imaging area but the imaging area was still processing images OK.
The communications area was amazed and asked how they could still process
data? The imaging technician said it was possible because the person who
designed the wide band data equipment knew that some day this type of failure
would happen so they designed circuitry into the synchronizer to handle this
type of problem so no data would be lost.
Additionally, there was an option to allow a certain number of bit errors to exist
during the data synchronization process (front panel thumb wheel switch).
The other thumbwheel switch was for setting the Unit # of the device so any
of the 4 synchronizers could be used in any position of the equipment rack.
And, this number was added to the header data information so it could be used
for troubleshooting and maintenance if any unit started to be faulty.
To my satisfaction … all 4 synchronizers worked flawlessly during the Voyager
missions.
By the way… please have a happy new year
Bob
“On its journey back, it amassed so much knowledge, it achieved consciousness itself. It became a living thing.”
– James T. Kirk, 2270s (Star Trek: The Motion Picture)
That second one seems to be headed at a right angle to our Voyager, so it’s at best moving tangent to the Solar System, and presumably it doesn’t have the fuel to steer itself toward out sun’s inner planets. But maybe it’s listening to our radio and TV broadcasts, and is picking up lots of packets from the part of our network that uses the satellites. So it’s probably sending a “Found one!” message back to home base, where they’ll receive it in a few thousand years. Then they’ll fire off a string of messages our way, which we’ll get in a few thousand more years. So stay tuned, everyone; we’ll hear from them eventually …
@John, don’t forget though that the earth has moved since Voyager set off so it might be heading straight for us after looping around a few other planets.
Aren’t those ‘motion tails’ on the wrong side? The dish should be on the back.