THE ROLE OF ENVIRONMENTAL TESTING IN SATELLITE RELIABILITY
Discussion of environmental testing and its role in satellite reliability
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Discussion of environmental testing and its role in satellite reliability
Environmental test contribution to spacecraft reliability, discussing optimizing techniques for planning space hardware involving environmental and system interactions
Reliability in unmanned spacecraft by environmental testing, specifically of Ariel I, Echo II and Relay I
Environmental testing by Argo D-4 high altitude rocket used in fixed-frequency topside sounding to simulate conditions encountered by satellite-borne instruments
Feasibility of nondestructive testing in space environment - environmental testing, prototype hardware design, manufacture, and evaluation
Mariner 5 spacecraft environmental test results
The generation and distribution of electric power for Space Station Freedom (SSF) is critical to the station's success. Work Package 4 (WP-04) has the responsibility for the design, development, test, and delivery of the Electric Power System (EPS) for the SSF. During launch, assembly, and operation, the EPS will be subjected to various environments. A test and verification approach has been developed to assure that the EPS will function in these environments. An overview of that test program is presented with emphasis on environmental testing of hardware. Two key areas of the test program are highlighted in the overview. One area is the verification of the Solar Power Module (SPM) and associated cargo element hardware. This area includes detailing the plans for development and qualification testing of the SPM hardware. One series of tests, including modal and acoustic, has been completed on a development cargo element. Another area highlighted is the acceptance testing of high-power Orbital Replacement Units (ORU). The environmental test equipment plans are presented and reviewed in light of an aggressive production rate, which delivers ORU's to the WP-04 and other Space Station Work Packages. Through implementing the test program as outlined, the EPS hardware will be certified for flight and operation on the Space Station Freedom.
Ariel II /UK-2/ international satellite environmental test program
Growth of environmental test routines for the qualification of communications satellite equipment
Environmental test history to launching and telemetry data of Ionosphere Explorer spacecraft
Environmental test program for Beacon Explorer spacecraft - optimization of thermal design and evaluation of current limiter
Environmental testing of thin film solar cells, studying long term thermal cycling effect on CdS solar cell
Description of aerospace environmental test equipment
Can improved environmental testing prevent on-orbit component failures such as those experienced in the Tracking and Data Relay Satellite (TDRS) constellation? TDRS communications have been available to user spacecraft continuously for over 11 years, during which the five TDRS's placed in orbit have demonstrated their redundancies and robustness by surviving 26 component failures. Nevertheless, additional environmental testing prior to launch could prevent the occurrence of some types of failures, and could help to maintain communication services. Specific testing challenges involve traveling wave tube assemblies (TWTA's) whose lives may decrease with on-off cycling, and heaters that are subject to thermal cycles. The development of test conditions and procedures should account for known thermal variations. Testing may also have the potential to prevent failures in which components such as diplexers have had their lives dramatically shortened because of particle migration in a weightless environment. Reliability modeling could be used to select additional components that could benefit from special testing, but experience shows that this approach has serious limitations. Through knowledge of on-orbit experience, and with advances in testing, communication satellite programs might avoid the occurrence of some types of failures, and extend future spacecraft longevity beyond the current TDRS design life of ten years. However, determining which components to test, and how must testing to do, remain problematical.
This document outlines key elements of a data format standard for transferring Navy environmental flight test data between members of the Collaborative Environments Characterization Working Group (CECWG). The plan applies to measured data as well as analyzed or processed data. This plan is intended to foster a more productive collaboration between CECWG members by providing a common interface format such that each agency only has to receive and transmit data in one common format. Ideally, each agency is thus only responsible for translating formats between the native format of each agency’s respective database of flight measurements and this common data transfer format.
Unusual requirements for the Pressure Distribution/Air Data System (PD/ADS) transducer thermal vacuum testing led to the development of a conductively heated and cooled, fully automated, bell-jar test system. The system has proven to be easily adaptable for other tests and offers the advantages of quick turn-around and low operational cost.
Evaluation of transient loads for environmental testing of spacecraft using multiple degree of freedom model
Reference data for spacecraft environmental testing and evaluation