Spacecraft Design, Development, and Operations

Instructor: Don Edberg, Professor of Aerospace Engineering at Cal Poly Pomona & Adjunct Lecturer, Astronautical Engineering, University of Southern California (USC), Former Boeing Technical Fellow  

• This comprehensive course focuses on the application of numerous engineering disciplines to the design and analysis of spacecraft

• Course includes many illustrative application examples of existing or heritage hardware and optional practice exercises to enhance the learning experience

• All students will receive an AIAA Certificate of Completion at the end of the course

OVERVIEW

This 36-hour course presents an extensive and coherent treatment of the fundamental principles involved with the interdisciplinary design of spacecraft. It is arguably THE most comprehensive short course on spacecraft design available.

After an introduction, we will first cover the process involved with the ascent of a spacecraft into orbit. We provide a listing of worldwide launch sites and a discussion of the space industry.

Subsequent lectures include a detailed history of spacecraftalong with current and future LVs and upcoming space missions. Then, we look at the two environments that determine many spacecraft design features: the pre-launch and launch environment, and the space environment. Pre-launch and launch environments include transportation, ascent trajectories and launch profile loads, and design drivers. Space environment includes gravitational perturbations (regression of nodes, periapsis advance), three-body motion & Lagrange points, space radiation and radiation belts. This is followed by a discussion of space environment effects, such as drag in low-earth orbit, gravity gradient, magnetic fields, solar radiation pressure, single-event upsets (SEUs), static discharge, atomic oxygen, orbital debris, outgassing, and internal mechanical disturbances.

Next, we provide a detailed introduction to spacecraft orbits and trajectories, including Kepler’s laws, conservation of energy and angular momentum, conic sections and classical orbital elements, and discuss “special” orbits such as transfer orbits, geostationary, Molniya, and sun-synchronous. Orbit details such as plane changes, transfers, the method of patched conics, and gravity-assist maneuvers are provided.

Orbital information is concluded with mention of orbital rendezvous and phasing. Low-thrust orbit raising and decay leading to atmosphere entry are discussed, as are aerobraking & aerocapture, deceleration, heating, and shape effects.

Next, it’s time to talk about the design cycle. We discuss mission design and payload development, including the design-development-flight operations cycle. Payload types, including direct- and remote-sensing, are introduced, followed by selection of payloads and some practical considerations. The elements of the spacecraft bus are listed along with major spacecraft design drivers: mass, power, and volume. We discuss initial mass & power estimation and allocation to subsystems including recommended margins, and the launch vehicle interface.

The next lectures delve into the details of the bus subsystems including structures and mechanisms, propulsion, attitude sensing and control, navigation and orbit determination, thermal control, and the environmental control and life support system (ECLSS) for a crewed spacecraft. We discuss power generation, distribution, and storage with solar arrays, batteries, radioisotope thermal generators (RTGs), and system sizing procedures. Two sections on long-distance tele-communications and command and data handling round out the bus subsystem exposé. These include the link equation and link budget calculation, frequencies used, antennas and ranging, the Deep Space Network (DSN), types of spacecraft data, encoding & telemetry, computers & data storage, and software development.

The course then discusses testing procedures (mechanical/mechanisms, VS&A = vibration, shock, & acoustic, thermal, vacuum, radio frequency (RF), software, and integration with the launch vehicle. Next, a number of spacecraft failures are presented along with the “Five Mistakes to Look For” and a discussion of redundancy. The final lecture is on cost estimation, including parametric modeling, cost models, cost-estimating relationships (CERs), and other associated costs such as launch vehicles, mission operations, DSN, and software.

KEY TOPICS

• History of spacecraft
• Current LVs and new developments
• Spacecraft Design Drivers 1: Pre-launch & launch environment
• Introduction to orbits, orbital mechanics
• Spacecraft Design Drivers 2: Space environment & how it affects spacecraft
• Orbital maneuvering & rendezvous
• Low-thrust trajectories, orbital decay, atmospheric entry
• Spacecraft Mission & Payload Development
• Structures, mechanisms, materials, structural analysis
• Propulsion systems
• Attitude sensing, guidance, navigation
• Spacecraft dynamics, and control
• Thermal control, Environmental Control & Life Support Systems (ECLSS) for crewed spacecraft
• Power systems
• Telecommunications
• Command and data handling
• Testing, failures, lessons learned
• Cost estimation

[See Detailed Outline Below]