4 ms·

It also helps to have $4.5B (in 2024 dollars) to spend on a project. https://airandspace.si.edu/collection-objects/voyager-spacecraft-mock-full-scale/nasm_A197

• throwaway2037 2y ago
  Not to mention that it has a chunk of highly radioactive plutonium that acts as a battery / power source. That whole thing is nuts that it got built, "shipped", and still works ~50 years later, approximately 1.21 jiga-kilometers away from Earth.
• makmanalp 2y ago
  It's not apples to apples of course but that's well within the ballpark of what spacex spends mostly just shooting stuff into orbit in a year: https://spacenews.com/spacex-and-the-categorical-imperative-to-achieve-low-launch-cost/ https://spacenews.com/spacex-and-the-categorical-imperative-... Especially for a first time in all of humanity type of mission, half a century ago, which yielded brand new data on faraway objects we'd never had, and considering it's still going and reporting data, it's arguably a bargain basement price for such a thing.
  • bdcravens 2y ago
    I 100% agree on the value of it. My point was the comparisons that are often made, to things like consumer electronics, really aren't apt.