Shulou(Shulou.com)11/24 Report--

CTOnews.com, October 24 (Xinhua) Voyager 2 is about 12 billion miles from Earth after a 46-year space flight. NASA recently completed the first step of a "remote OTA update", which took 18 hours to complete the transmission of the "update package." if the test is successful, it will officially launch the "refresh" program on October 28.

The main purpose of this update is to prevent Voyager 2 from repeating the mistake of Voyager 1 by reducing the ignition times of the thruster and prolonging the ignition time to maintain the attitude of the probe.

This update will result in some data loss, but more data will be returned in the long run, and the patch will also fix a failure that caused Voyager 1's attitude adjustment and control system (AACS) to mistransmit instructions in 2022.

NASA plans to test the patch on Voyager 2, and if all goes according to plan, it will also send the patch to Voyager 1, which is currently more than 15 billion miles from Earth.

CTOnews.com Note: the Voyager probe has been in service since its launch in 1977 and has far exceeded its expected life expectancy, but during the long flight of nearly half a century, there have been some unexpected problems, one of which is the aging of thrusters.

The thruster is used to target the Voyager probe at Earth's high-gain antenna, and thanks to the careful protection of the mission control center of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, California, it still has enough hydrazine fuel to last until 2037, but the thruster itself needs to be cleaned.

For many years, every propeller ignition leaves residue in the system, which accumulates slowly and steadily. If it accumulates too much, the fuel pipe may be blocked and the probe will no longer work properly.

Related readings:

"NASA patches the Voyager probe to alleviate the aging problem of thrusters."

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