Flight qualification test results for violet cells

Abstract

The violet solar cell has been submitted to a flight qualification program. The tasks included in this program were: to define the violet cell's electrical output from -100 C to +100 C; to determine the violet cell's degradation under 2 MeV, 1 MeV and .3 MeV proton irradiation, under a high humidity environment and under ultraviolet light; to thermal cycle two similar modules of violet cells; to flight qualify a full size violet cell panel for the IMP-J flight; and to obtain a primary balloon-flown standard of the violet cell type. The results of these tests demonstrate that the violet cell is fully qualified for space flight use with no further development work. The tests show that the violet cell offers a power increase of at least twenty-one per cent over presently available commercial cells.