Development of the Payload System and Obc Microcontroller Coding for a Cubic Satellite Performing an Additive Self-repair Experiment in Space

Additive manufacturing, which is also known as three-dimensional printing, in space is one of the most promising technologies advancing current capabilities for in-orbit space manufacturing and assembly. Additive manufacturing contributes to the reduction of cost per kilogram and number of launches, thus facilitating extraterrestrial colonization and deep-space exploration. The state of the art includes advancing efforts inside the International Space Station (ISS). However, the ISS is a controlled environment and, to the best of our knowledge, no spacecraft or satellite has performed additive manufacturing tasks in the extreme environment of outer space. In this work a 1U CubeSat named Orbital Factory II (OF2) was developed to perform a technological capability demonstration featuring a 1-D printing mechanism that will deposit conductive ink and simulate repairing of an electric circuit. OF2 was launched on a Northrop Grumman Antares space rocket on November 2, 2019 and it was deployed from the CRS2 NG-12 (Cygnus) on January 31, 2020. This document presents the payload developed and the libraries coded for the on-board computer (OBC) for this OF2 CubeSat. This is the first satellite ever launched by the University of Texas at El Paso (UTEP)