An Assembly, Integration, and Testing Methodology for Enabling Next Generation Microsatellite Missions
- Paper ID
96672
- DOI
- author
- company
Space Flight Laboratory (SFL); University of Arizona
- country
Canada
- year
2025
- abstract
The DEFIANT-XL spacecraft platform is a scaled-up version of the Space Flight Laboratory’s flight-proven DEFIANT platform, designed from the outset with assembly, integration, and testing in mind. This platform addresses the growing needs within the small satellite industry for faster timelines and lower cost missions by dividing the spacecraft into two modules: a bus module, housing a suite of radios, avionics, and attitude control hardware; and a payload module, capable of housing instruments required for various mission needs. This paper discusses the assembly, integration, and testing methodology of a DEFIANT-XL platform developed for the Aspera astrophysics mission.\newline Developed under NASA’s Astrophysics Pioneers Program, the Aspera mission will use a far-ultraviolet spectrograph as its payload to map the warm-hot coronal gas in the circumgalactic medium surrounding galaxies to understand how these gases influence galaxy evolution. This payload, developed by the science team at the University of Arizona, drives strict cleanliness requirements to be met throughout the assembly, integration, and testing process. Purging methods and handling procedures to meet such requirements are presented. The discussion continues with a presentation of the testing methodologies of DEFIANT-XL’s decoupled bus. These methods allow for system-level risk-reduction testing under flexible payload timelines, and include long-form functional checks of the bus electronics, and a bus-only electromagnetic compatibility test.\newline Mechanical ground support equipment is used to streamline the assembly, integration, and test process of the DEFIANT-XL platform. The design of this equipment is described with its overall contribution to the process highlighted. Custom risers are implemented to align subassemblies, accounting for tolerance stack up. Partitioned solar cell covers facilitate testing of individual cell strings while providing maximum protection to the remaining solar cell strings. Deployable inhibits are utilized on all mechanisms, providing dual fault tolerance as per launch vehicle integration safety requirements. Antenna hats are installed over each antenna allowing for over-the-air testing of communications systems in various environments. A low-cost custom dual-axis rotation device is employed to test deployable mechanisms in an appropriate orientation under a 1$g$ environment. Finally, craning and shipping ground support equipment is presented for moving the spacecraft through the laboratory environment and launch vehicle payload processing facility.\newline Meeting a heightened industry demand for such missions, DEFIANT-XL’s design philosophy coupled with the practices presented herein, enhances the scalability of both spacecraft platforms and development processes. When applied to future microsatellite astrophysics missions, these practices reduce cost and development timelines.\newline