Session
Technical Session V: Standards and Modularity
Abstract
The Department of Defense’s Space Test Program Satellite #3 (STPSat-3) was successfully launched as part of the Operationally Responsive Space (ORS)-3 Mission on a Minotaur I from Wallops Flight Facility, Virginia, on November 19th, 2013. STPSat-3 was the second delivery on STP’s Standard Interface Vehicle contract with Ball Aerospace & Technologies Corp. and followed the first SIV delivery’s on-going, successful mission (STPSat-2). After the STPSat-3 launch, the government and contractor team completed initialization and checkout of the spacecraft bus in three days and five separate science instrument payloads in thirty days. No significant anomalies occurred with the space vehicle, and only minor issues were encountered in refining the concept of operations to accommodate the operational desires of all five payloads once the vehicle was on-orbit. The successful acquisition and remarkable pace of commissioning STPSat-3 clearly demonstrates the significant benefits of using multiple builds of standard space vehicle designs for small satellite missions. This paper will discuss many of these benefits that were realized from the program inception through on-orbit operations. For example, during the spacecraft development process, technical risks with the bus were well understood and the requirements verification process could be streamlined to focus on the mission unique payload interfaces. The standard interface design allowed for a substantial change in the payload manifest and a re-design of the payload layout after the bus had been fully assembled and only 11 months prior to Pre-Ship Review. With a vehicle design intended for multiple launch environments, the program was able to begin without a known launch vehicle, and was thus able to take advantage of the ORS-3 mission of opportunity on short notice. Leveraging lessons learned from the STPSat-2 program, launch and early orbit operations were streamlined and efficient, with bus checkout completed rapidly, allowing the initialization and checkout of payloads to begin promptly. Finally, there was a significant cost savings realized from STPSat-2 to STPSat-3 due to incorporation of lessons learned and significant re-use of engineering.
STPSat-3: The Benefits of a Multiple-Build, Standard Payload Interface Spacecraft Bus
The Department of Defense’s Space Test Program Satellite #3 (STPSat-3) was successfully launched as part of the Operationally Responsive Space (ORS)-3 Mission on a Minotaur I from Wallops Flight Facility, Virginia, on November 19th, 2013. STPSat-3 was the second delivery on STP’s Standard Interface Vehicle contract with Ball Aerospace & Technologies Corp. and followed the first SIV delivery’s on-going, successful mission (STPSat-2). After the STPSat-3 launch, the government and contractor team completed initialization and checkout of the spacecraft bus in three days and five separate science instrument payloads in thirty days. No significant anomalies occurred with the space vehicle, and only minor issues were encountered in refining the concept of operations to accommodate the operational desires of all five payloads once the vehicle was on-orbit. The successful acquisition and remarkable pace of commissioning STPSat-3 clearly demonstrates the significant benefits of using multiple builds of standard space vehicle designs for small satellite missions. This paper will discuss many of these benefits that were realized from the program inception through on-orbit operations. For example, during the spacecraft development process, technical risks with the bus were well understood and the requirements verification process could be streamlined to focus on the mission unique payload interfaces. The standard interface design allowed for a substantial change in the payload manifest and a re-design of the payload layout after the bus had been fully assembled and only 11 months prior to Pre-Ship Review. With a vehicle design intended for multiple launch environments, the program was able to begin without a known launch vehicle, and was thus able to take advantage of the ORS-3 mission of opportunity on short notice. Leveraging lessons learned from the STPSat-2 program, launch and early orbit operations were streamlined and efficient, with bus checkout completed rapidly, allowing the initialization and checkout of payloads to begin promptly. Finally, there was a significant cost savings realized from STPSat-2 to STPSat-3 due to incorporation of lessons learned and significant re-use of engineering.
