Preliminary design and cost assessment of a University Small Satellite Platform

The thesis work is focused on the preliminary design of a small satellite platform developed by the University of Pisa, in collaboration with the space company Sitael S.p.a. After a first platform architecture assessment and the mission specifications definition, the project has mainly treated the structure characteristics and the subsystems performance, especially those of the power generation subsystem. The starting requirement of the project consists only in reaching a high value of the ratio between the power producted by the solar array and the overall mass of the satellite: approximately 200 W for a total mass below 50 kg. The project objective is therefore to demonstrate that with typical Cube Sats COTS devices and design procedures it is possible to reach a high available power level on board, maintaining a large flexibility in the configuration. For this reason, the mission main target is to demonstrate technologies and current capabilities without having specific commercial scopes: no payload has been defined. The design of the solar panels and their deployment has been performed. The load environment simulation, particularly critical at launch due to vibro-acoustic random loads, represented the key design parameter for assessing the solar panels configuration, material and their thicknesses. Along with the structural trade study performed by means of FEM programs, a careful design of both active and passive hinges that guide the deployment phase, has been performed, as well as the implementation of the actuation mechanisms useful to hold down the panels and then release them once in orbit. Costs as well as risk evaluation have always had a key role on choice process to obtain performances. Anyway, in the thesis, the estimation of the cost of this mission has been compared to the common results of the standard cost models applied to typical LEO Earth observation satellites