Attitude Dependent De-orbit Lifetime Analysis of an Aerodynamic Drag Sail Demonstration Spacecraft and Detailed Thermal Subsystem Design for a Polar Orbiting Communications Nanosatellite

• Main Author: Tarantini, Vincent
• Other Authors: Zee, Robert E., Aerospace Science and Engineering
• Format: Thesis
• Language: English
• Subjects: De-orbit; Drag sail; Thermal control; Attitude determination and control; 0538; Antarctic; The Antarctic; Antarc*; Antarctica
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/1807/33557

Contributions to two missions are presented. The first is a demonstration mission called CanX-7 that uses a 4 square metre drag sail to de-orbit a 3.5 kg satellite. In order to estimate the effectiveness of the drag sail, a novel method is developed that takes into account the time-varying nature of the projected drag area. The Space Flight Laboratory designed drag sail is shown to be sufficient to de-orbit the CanX-7 spacecraft within the 25 year requirement. The Antarctic Broadband demonstrator spacecraft is a 20 cm cubical nanosatellite that will demonstrate the feasibility of a Ka-band link between the research community in Antarctica and stakeholders in Australia. In support of this mission, a passive thermal control subsystem is designed that will keep all the components within their operational temperature limits at all times throughout the mission. MAST