Design of the Electrical Power System for the ESTCube-1 Satellite

Pajusalu, Mihkel; Rantsus, Ramon; Pelakauskas, M.; Leitu, Ahto; Ilbis, Erik; Kalde, Jaanus; Lillmaa, Henri; Reinumägi, R.; Voormansik, Kaupo; Zalite, Karlis; Allik, Viljo; Noorma, Mart; Lätt, S.

doi:10.2478/v10047-012-0014-4

Cited by 9 publications

(7 citation statements)

References 11 publications

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“…For both the CDHS and the EPS, fault tolerance is being addressed at a software level as well. More detailed descriptions of all fault-tolerant methods used in the CDHS and the EPS can be found in [17][18][19].…”

Section: Satellite Designmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The peak power consumption should be less than 6 W. A 12 V power bus should be provided. To mitigate the risk of mission failure, high levels of redundancy and fault tolerance have been provided in a command and data handling subsystem [17] and an electric power subsystem [18,19]. In this article, we analyse the mission, describe the satellite design, and present the results of system level tests.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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ESTCube-1 nanosatellite for electric solar wind sail in-orbit technology demonstration

Lätt¹,

Slavinskis

Ilbis

et al. 2014

Proc. Estonian Acad. Sci.

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This paper presents the mission analysis, requirements, system design, system level test results, as well as mass and power budgets of a 1-unit CubeSat ESTCube-1 built to perform the first in-orbit demonstration of electric solar wind sail (E-sail) technology. The E-sail is a propellantless propulsion system concept that uses thin charged electrostatic tethers for turning the momentum flux of a natural plasma stream, such as the solar wind, into spacecraft propulsion. ESTCube-1 will deploy and charge a 10 m long tether and measure changes in the satellite spin rate. These changes result from the Coulomb drag interaction with the ionospheric plasma that is moving with respect to the satellite due to the orbital motion of the satellite. The following subsystems have been developed to perform and to support the E-sail experiment: a tether deployment subsystem based on a piezoelectric motor; an attitude determination and control subsystem to provide the centrifugal force for tether deployment, which uses electromagnetic coils to spin up the satellite to one revolution per second with controlled spin axis alignment; an imaging subsystem to verify tether deployment, which is based on a 640 × 480 pixel resolution digital image sensor; an electron gun to keep the tether at a high positive potential; a high voltage source to charge the tether; a command and data handling subsystem; and an electrical power subsystem with high levels of redundancy and fault tolerance to mitigate the risk of mission failure.

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Section: Satellite Designmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

ESTCube-1 nanosatellite for electric solar wind sail in-orbit technology demonstration

Lätt¹,

Slavinskis

Ilbis

et al. 2014

Proc. Estonian Acad. Sci.

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“…where m mr0 = 0.1 kg corresponds to the mass of the motorized reel assembly in case of a short tether such as that used in ESTCube-1 Pajusalu et al, 2012) and Aalto-1 Näsilä et al, 2011) CubeSat missions, ρ mr = 500 kg m −3 is the assumed mass density of the reel structure with respect to its contained volume, V mt = m mt /ρ Al is the solid aluminium volume of the main tether and η mr = 0.3 is the packaging factor of the reeled tether.…”

Section: Main Tether Reel Assemblymentioning

confidence: 99%

Electric solar wind sail mass budget model

Janhunen

Quarta

Mengali

2013

Geosci. Instrum. Method. Data Syst.

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Abstract. The electric solar wind sail (E-sail) is a new type of propellantless propulsion system for Solar System transportation, which uses the natural solar wind to produce spacecraft propulsion. The E-sail consists of thin centrifugally stretched tethers that are kept charged by an onboard electron gun and, as such, experience Coulomb drag through the high-speed solar wind plasma stream. This paper discusses a mass breakdown and a performance model for an E-sail spacecraft that hosts a mission-specific payload of prescribed mass. In particular, the model is able to estimate the total spacecraft mass and its propulsive acceleration as a function of various design parameters such as the number of tethers and their length. A number of subsystem masses are calculated assuming existing or near-term E-sail technology. In light of the obtained performance estimates, an Esail represents a promising propulsion system for a variety of transportation needs in the Solar System.

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“…This article describes the electrical power system (EPS) of the satellite [8,9], how the system was designed and how it was tested. The EPS harvests energy from solar panels, stores it in lithium-ion battery cells, and distributes it to other consumers.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Schematic of the maximum power point tracking system for two opposite sides of the satellite[9].Proceedings of the EstonianAcademy of Sciences, 2014, 63, 2S, 232-241 236…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Design and pre-flight testing of the electrical power system for the ESTCube-1 nanosatellite

Pajusalu¹,

Ilbis²,

Ilves³

et al. 2014

Proc. Estonian Acad. Sci.

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This work describes the final design and implementation of the electrical power system for ESTCube-1, a 1-unit CubeSat tasked with testing the electrostatic tether concept and associated technologies for the electric solar wind sail in polar low Earth orbit. The mission required an efficient and reliable power system to be designed that could efficiently handle highly variable power requirements and protect the satellite from damage caused by malfunctions in its individual subsystems, while using only commercial-off-the-shelf components. The system was developed from scratch and includes a novel redundant standalone nearly 90% efficient maximum power point tracking system, based on a commercially available integrated circuit, a lithiumion battery based fault-tolerant power storage solution, a highly controllable and monitorable power distribution system, capable of sustaining loads of up to 10 W, and an AVR microcontroller based control solution, heavily utilizing non-volatile ferroelectric random access memories. The electrical power system was finalized in January 2013 and was launched into orbit on 7th of May, 2013. In this paper, we describe the requirements for the subsystem, the design of the subsystem, pre-flight testing, and flight qualification.

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Design of the Electrical Power System for the ESTCube-1 Satellite

Cited by 9 publications

References 11 publications

ESTCube-1 nanosatellite for electric solar wind sail in-orbit technology demonstration

ESTCube-1 nanosatellite for electric solar wind sail in-orbit technology demonstration

Electric solar wind sail mass budget model

Design and pre-flight testing of the electrical power system for the ESTCube-1 nanosatellite

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