Changing the economics of space. STRaND-1 & TDS-1. How the UK does Low Cost TechDemo Missions. Shaun Kenyon Mission Concepts, SSTL

Transcription

1 Changing the economics of space STRaND-1 & TDS-1 How the UK does Low Cost TechDemo Missions Shaun Kenyon Mission Concepts, SSTL

2 In the next 15 minutes Introducing STRaND-1 and TDS-1 Comparison of System Architectures Comparison of Mass Fractions Comparison of Management Structures Comparison of Funding Models Comparison of Risk Profiles The Answer to The Question! And what does this mean for British CubeSats? Q&A Commercial in Confidence 2

3 TechDemoSat A Space Pack Mule SSTL-150 Class 25% mass fraction 8 UK-provided payload experiments Potential for software experiments Project Kick-off Oct 10 Due For Launch Q Public Funding Commercial in Confidence 3

4 STRaND-1 A Space Phoenix 3U CubeSat 30% payload mass fraction 5 Surrey-provided payload experiments Project kickoff Jan 2010 (volunteering) Full-time June 12 Feb 13 Launch 25 th Feb 2013 A Baptism of Fire! Commercial in Confidence 4

5 Commercial in Confidence 5

6 How the Architectures Compare S-Rx S-Rx S-Rx S-Tx S-Tx VHF-Rx UHF-Tx OBC OBC AOCS AOCS OBC AOCS Heritage Units Mass Memory High Speed Memory X-TX Mass Memory New Units Solar Panel Solar Panel BATT PDM BCM BCM Solar Panel Solar Panel Solar Panel Prop BATT PDM BCR x3 Prop Prop Solar Panel Solar Panel Commercial in Confidence 6

7 Mass Breakdowns TechDemoSat Mass budget 25% Propellant AOCS 1% 10% Power 18% Harness 5% Structure 28% Comms Propulsion 4% Environment 4% OBDH 3% 2% STRaND-1 Mass Budget Harness 8% Comms 5% Structure 31% 30% AOCS 10% OBDH 2% Power 14% Commercial in Confidence 7

8 How They Were Organised Ad Hoc Volunteer Group Roles sometimes unclear Industry standard milestones rejected in preference to ad hoc peer review Providers deeply involved in platform design Difficult to make objective trades Core team distributed over multiple sites Standard SSTL Project organisation Clear roles, core team Industry standard milestone reviews Providers work with Platform team Platform design balanced for all payloads Co-located Core team Commercial in Confidence 8

9 How They Were Funded Purely SSTL-SSC costs incurred Initially as a 50%-50% no funds exchanged mission between SSTL and SSC Volunteer effort SSTL-funded launch Full-time paid-for project for last 6 months Total costs < 1M Technology Strategy Board / SEEDA public funding for platform, launch and operations providers find their own funding TDS- 1 effectively a free ride into space SSTL additional investment for own research Total costs < 10M Commercial in Confidence 9

10 Risk Profiles SSTL / SSC Risks only Single string system design Documentation light Process light No component traceability for in-house units Reduced test campaign Lower TRL payloads with more speculative benefits Shared risks over multiple stakeholders Dual functional redundancy Fly new with old SSTL standard test campaign philosophy Higher TRL payloads with more directly applicable near term benefits Commercial in Confidence 10

11 So.. How Does The UK do Low Cost Tech Demo? Tune the mission risk profile to the budget Bigger missions need more certainty in payoff Smaller missions can be more speculative Public money is sacred What does this mean for British CubeSats? Costs are lower, so can afford to take more risks for greater TRL jumps Can sometimes be at odds with sacred public funding Anything that isn t pushing the limits of possibility is a waste of a CubeSat Commercial in Confidence 11

12 Changing the economics of space Thank You Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd. Tycho House, 20 Stephenson Road, Surrey Research Park, Guildford, Surrey, GU27YE, United Kingdom Tel: +44(0) Fax:+44(0) Web: