Starlink V2 Mini
SpaceX made a couple of big tech reveals over the weekend, as some new Starlink hardware is about to head into orbit.
On February 26th, Elon Musk’s space services company showed off their new Starlink satellites that they’re calling the “V2 Mini”. The small satellites are meant to bridge the gap between the current V1 and V1.5 satellites - and the new, comparatively huge V2 hardware.
This is needed because the standard V2 platform is so big, that only the company’s prototype Starship can launch and deploy it. And they could just wait for their new workhorse rocket to be certified - but back in December 2022, the FTC granted SpaceX with approval to launch 7500 of the next-gen satellites.
So, not wanting to waste any time, the team at SpaceX have decided to trim some of the features of the V2 down so that they could use their current workhorse - the Falcon 9 - to begin launching their upgraded tech as early as February 27th.
That’s right, this was so sudden, that there’s already 21 Starlink V2 Mini sats orbiting above us right now.
And while they’re not as powerful as the full-sized models, these Mini V2s still have about four times the capacity as the older V1 satellites - thanks to the more powerful antennas, which give them access to a new bandwidth of frequencies.
In addition to the new satellites though, SpaceX announced the Minis were also fitted with new Argon-powered electric thrusters.
They had previously been using krypton-powered variants of the Xenon-fueled thrusters which are favoured by most of the industry. Xenon is very expensive compared to Krypton - at upwards of 10,000 USD per kilogram, vs $1500 - which is why SpaceX was going that route. Argon is reportedly even cheaper - $17 USD per kilogram at the worst - which is practically free by comparison.
The new V2 Minis will be using these thrusters for manoeuvring, making them even more cost efficient.
It’s certainly a statement to make a sub-optimal version of your new satellite rather than just waiting for your new launch vehicle to be ready. It likely indicates that SpaceX believes it will be at least a couple more months before Starship is operational enough to try dispensing the full-sized V2 units.
Regardless, it’s obvious that upgrading the Starlink network is too important for SpaceX to wait. I’m sure Starlink customers would agree.