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BEESAT-3: A Picosatellite Developed by Students
... Since TU Berlin was very successfull with the Berlin Experimental and Educational Satellite (BEESAT-1), which was launched in 2009 and is still operating, it had launched the initiative to build a completely new CubeSat, BEESAT-3, in lecture courses. The payload of BEESAT-3 is a new S-band transmitter for picosatellites, with downlink rates of 1 Mbit/s [13]. The phases of development were spread over four semesters and the students designed the subsystems and all other mission aspects. ...
Robotics plays a major role in educating engineering students and can be integrated into a curriculum in many ways. Problem-based lecture courses allow only a limited technical complexity due to the number of their corresponding credit points. From all project categories described, long-term student-driven research projects are the most challenging regarding management. Several of such projects have been initiated at the Technische Universität Berlin (TUB). One example is the rover SEAR which participated in space robotics competitions. During many years of experience in hands-on education, the major characteristics and challenges of student-driven projects were identified. Proven methods and good practices for addressing these challenges are discussed. If project leaders carefully respect all conditions of a student project, they can reduce the risks by implementing measures to keep a steady work-flow. Thus, the success rate of complex robotics research conducted by a student workforce can be increased significantly.
This paper is based on the premises that the purpose of
engineering education is to graduate engineers who can design,
and that design thinking is complex. The paper begins by briefly
reviewing the history and role of design in the engineering
curriculum. Several dimensions of design thinking are then
detailed, explaining why design is hard to learn and harder still to
teach, and outlining the research available on how well design
thinking skills are learned. The currently most-favored
pedagogical model for teaching design, project-based learning
(PBL), is explored next, along with available assessment data on
its success. Two contexts for PBL are emphasized: first-year
cornerstone courses and globally dispersed PBL courses. Finally,
the paper lists some of the open research questions that must be
answered to identify the best pedagogical practices of improving
design learning, after which it closes by making recommendations
for research aimed at enhancing design learning.
On the 22nd of October 2008, EuroLaunch launched the REXUS-4 rocket at Esrange in Northern Sweden. EuroLaunch is a joint venture of the DLR Mobile Rocket Base and the SSC Esrange Space Center. REXUS-4 was a two-stage unguided solid propellant sounding rocket. The vehicle consisted of a Nike motor as 1st stage, an Improved Orion motor as 2nd stage, a motor adapter, a recovery system, a service system, two experiment modules, and a nosecone. The REXUS-4 payload was comprised of five technological experiments from German and Swedish Universities. The rocket was spin-stabilized during the ascent. After the burn-out of the 2nd stage a yoyo system de-spun the rocket to a rate of only a few degrees per second. At an altitude of 71 km the nosecone was jettisoned. The payload reached its apogee at 175 km.
The REXUS-4 mission was also the maiden flight of a newly developed rocket service system. After this successful demonstration, it has been implemented into the REXUS/BEXUS programme. This German-Swedish student programme offers annual flights for student experiments on sounding rockets and stratospheric balloons.
This paper gives a short overview on the development of the REXUS service system and points out the advantages of using standard interfaces for student experiments. Furthermore it contains a description of the REXUS-4 vehicle, the mission, the campaign and the experiments. Some experiments are described in more detail. During the ballistic flight the MIRIAM experiment of the University of Armed Forces in München and the Mars Society Germany was separated from the main payload to test a balloon system that will be used for the entry of a probe in the Martian atmosphere in the future. Several cameras on the REXUS-4 payload as well as cameras and telemetry on the MIRIAM flight system monitored the separation and inflation during the ballistic flight phase. The VERTICAL experiment from the Technical University München verified the start-up procedures of the CubeSat MOVE and its solar panel deployment under real spaceflight conditions. The paper also gives an overview on the REXUS/BEXUS programme and its chances for students.
By involving all affected disciplines early, costly design mistakes can be avoided. These concepts are now becoming the standard for the aerospace industry. Indeed, the United States Air Force Material Command has mandated Integrated Product Development on all of their new programs. This is a difficult concept for tradition-bound engineers in industry to accept, and a radical cultural change in attitudes is often necessary before the IPD concept can be implemented. What does this environment portend for future aerospace engineers, and what, if any. changes are necessary in aerospace engineering education? Two considerations come to mind - the depth and breadth of the technical curriculum and the relevance of the student's design experience. I address these issues from the perspective of a Preliminary Design Department.
The Radio Aurora Explorer (RAX) is an NSF sponsored nanosatellite being designed, built, and tested by students at the University of Michigan; it is currently scheduled for launch in 2010. The spacecraft utilizes a passive magnetic attitude control system consisting of a permanent magnet aligned with the axis of symmetry of the nanosatellite, and two magnetic hysteresis rods, each aligned along the other two principal axes of the nanosatellite; these hysteresis rods provide energy dissipation necessary to achieve alignment of the axis of the symmetry with the Earth's magnetic field. This paper presents an analytical model for the passive magnetically controlled attitude dynamics of the RAX nanosatellite, along with numerical simulations to assess the properties of the attitude dynamics. Copyright © 2010 by the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Inc. All rights reserved.
The objective of the Canadian Advanced Nanospace eXperiment (CanX) program is to de-velop highly capable nanospacecraft, i.e. spacecraft under 10 kilograms, in short timeframes of 2-3 years. CanX missions offer low-cost and rapid access to space for scientists, technol-ogy developers and operationally-responsive missions. The Space Flight Laboratory (SFL), at the University of Toronto Institute for Aerospace Studies (UTIAS) has developed the CanX-2 nanosatellite that launched in April 2008. CanX-2, a 3.5-kg, 10 x 10 x 34 cm satellite, features a collection of scientific and engineering payloads that push the envelope of capability for this class of spacecraft. The primary mission of CanX-2 is to perform a number of university exper-iments. These experiments include a miniature atmospheric spectrometer designed to detect greenhouse gas concentrations, a GPS signal occultation experiment designed to map electron and water vapour concentrations in the ionosphere and troposphere respectively, and a materi-als science experiment which evaluates a novel atomic oxygen resistant coating. The secondary mission of CanX-2 is to test and demonstrate several enabling technologies for precise formation flight. These technologies include a custom cold-gas propulsion system, a nanosatellite reac-tion wheel as part of a three-axis stabilized attitude control subsystem, and a GPS receiver. After two successful years in orbit, the nanosatellite has met or exceeded all mission objectives and continues to demonstrate the cost-effective capabilities of this class of spacecraft. Key achievements to date include a characterization of the propulsion system, a full demonstration of the attitude determination and control subsystem including capabilities in accurate pay-load pointing, unprecedented radio performance for an operational nanosatellite, and hundreds of successful science operations. The mission, the engineering and scientific payloads, and a discussion of notable orbit achievements and experiences of CanX-2 are presented in this paper.
Teaching engineering design through senior project or capstone engineering courses has increased in recent years. The trend toward increasing the design component in engineering curricula is part of an effort to better prepare graduates for engineering practice. This paper describes the standard practices and current state of capstone design education throughout the country as revealed through a literature search of over 100 papers relating to engineering design courses. Major topics include the development of capstone design courses, course descriptions, project information, details of industrial involvement, and special aspects of team-oriented design projects. An extensive list of references is provided.
For attitude stabilization of earth satellites, frequently, magnetic systems are used. A main part of such systems are magnetic torquers that, together with the geomagnetic field, produce moments to control the attitude or angular velocity of the satellite. Magnetic torquers consist of permanent magnets or of coils. The coils may be air cored or iron cored. A compromise between permanent magnets and coils is given by chargeable magnets (semi-permanent magnets), i.e., coils with a core consisting of a material with high remanence and medium coercive force. To damp angular oscillations and to remove spin rates, permeable rods are used which undergo magnetization changes in the geomagnetic field, thus transforming the kinetic energy of the satellite into hysteresis and eddy-current losses. Other damping devices consist of a secondary mass dissipating energy by moving relative to the satellite. Extensive testing is necessary to assure proper functioning and reliability of the devices described.
This paper describes the design, implementation and testing of flight software for KySat-1 a picosatellite scheduled to launch in 2009. The paper also discusses the challenges of developing dependable software in an academic environment and the development of dependable software for commercial off the shelf (COTS) hardware in space applications. Techniques employed to design for reuse and examples of software reuse in recent sub-orbital and near-space missions are also described. The software architecture, software engineering practices, and testing techniques developed for KySat-1 will serve as the basis for a series of future Kentucky Space Consortium missions.
The Technical University of Berlin has the objective to develop such components, which are not available yet. The first device under development is the so called "micro wheel", which is designed to be used in pico satellites, allowing a precise 3-axis attitude stabilization. The verification of these wheels in space will be done by BEESAT, the first pico satellite of TU Berlin. The main objective of BeeSat is the on orbit verification of newly developed micro wheels for pico satellite applications. These wheels, with the size of a one Euro coin in diameter, supported by DLR (FKZ 50JR0552) and developed in cooperation with Astro-und Feinwerktechnik, will drastically improve the actuation capabilities of pico satellites.
In order to provide a realistic, hands-on educational experience
for spacecraft design students, three complimentary project-based
spacecraft design activities have been developed. These design programs
are similar given that each relies on simplicity, speed, and
self-sufficiency. These attributes (1) allow students to understand the
full technical design of a spacecraft system, (2) expose students to the
full developmental life-cycle, and (3) introduce students to the
challenges of managing a team in order to engineer a complete system.
The programs differ in their fidelity and comprehensiveness in order to
provide a spectrum of approaches from which educators may select based
upon their resources. This paper discusses the educational objectives of
these project-based spacecraft design programs. It also reviews the
specific design guidelines and strategies for each. Finally, it presents
5 years of results from previous and ongoing projects, and it presents
future educational enhancements and spacecraft missions
Many-in-depth studies of engineering education have been performed
over the past 35 years. It is noted that, surprisingly, the results of
these studies possess a consistent thread; in general the engineering
education programs in this country fail to prepare the students to
practice engineering. The author reviews candidate practices course
topics. He discusses their implementation as curriculum content,
investigates the attendant problems and solutions, and describes a
`capstone' design course, taught at the University of Texas at Arlington
(UTA) since 1986, which has addressed these concerns with a good degree
of success
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