CubeSail: A low cost CubeSat based solar sail demonstration mission

Date
2011-10-13
Authors
Lappas V.
Adeli N.
Visagie L.
Fernandez J.
Theodorou T.
Steyn W.
Perren M.
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Journal ISSN
Volume Title
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Abstract
CubeSail is a nano-solar sail mission based on the 3U CubeSat standard, which is currently being designed and built at the Surrey Space Centre, University of Surrey. CubeSail will have a total mass of around 3 kg and will deploy a 5 × 5 m sail in low Earth orbit. The primary aim of the mission is to demonstrate the concept of solar sailing and end-of-life de-orbiting using the sail membrane as a drag-sail. The spacecraft will have a compact 3-axis stabilised attitude control system, which uses three magnetic torquers aligned with the spacecraft principle axis as well as a novel two-dimensional translation stage separating the spacecraft bus from the sail. CubeSail's deployment mechanism consists of four novel booms and four-quadrant sail membranes. The proposed booms are made from tape-spring blades and will deploy the sail membrane from a 2U CubeSat standard structure. This paper presents a systems level overview of the CubeSat mission, focusing on the mission orbit and de-orbiting, in addition to the deployment, attitude control and the satellite bus. © 2011 COSPAR.
Description
Keywords
Attitude control, CubeSat, De-orbiting, Deployment, Solar sail, Space debris
Citation
Advances in Space Research
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