Wednesday, April 19, 2000

Teamsat

 1997-066A


MAQSAT-H (Maquette Satellite - haut) was developed for the Ariane 502 test launch. The dummy satellite was built by Kayser-Threde of Munchen. With a mass of 2300 kg (not including the 350 kg TEAMSAT?), it is placed above the SPELTRA and MAQSAT-B. It is a mockup of a comsat and has a dummy solar panel, together with accelerometers and other launch measurement instrumentation. On the SPELTRA mounting is an ACU 1194V satellite adapter (130 kg), and the 3.80m tall MAQSAT-H, a cone topped with a cylinder, above which is a dummy solar array and an antenna tripod on which acoustic sensors are mounted. Inside MAQSAT-H and mounted directly on the ACU is TEAMSAT.

TEAMSAT is Technology Educational Experiment Added to MAQSAT, an ESTEC experiment package with a mass of 350 kg. With a battery-powered one-week life, TEAMSAT carried a camera to record launch events. Once in GTO, it will eject the 160 kg YES tether satellite which uses the SEDS deployer. YES was study tether deployment dynamics in GTO.  [701]  [702] but concerns about possible collision hazards led ESA to cancel the tether experiment. TEAMSAT also comprises the FPE, AVS and ODD experiments. The 2.5m diameter, 2.5m high ODD cylinder is painted 25 percent black and 75 percent white to aid in optical observations.

At EAP separation, an unexpected roll of the EPC core stage caused propellant to move to the edges of the tank, fooling the fuel gauge into shutting down the main engine 10 to 20s too early. This left the orbit several thousand km low; the EPC fell in the Pacific off New Guinea instead of near Ecuador. The EAP boosters sank in the Atlantic when their parachutes failed. Actual apogee was 27000 km instead of the planned 36000 km.


Maqsat H 
 

DateTimeEventOrbit  

1997 Oct 30  1343:08  Ignition 
 1343:15  Launch  
 1345  T+2:29 EAP Solids sep, 60 km 
 1351  T+8:24 Fairing sep 
 1352  EPC shutdown 0.21 km/s low  
 1352  T+9:48 EPC sep  -200? x 500? x 7 
 1353  T+9:56 EPS burn 
 1401  T+18:33 EPS MECO? 
 1411  T+27:26 EPS MECO 
 1411  T+27:54 EPS sep 
 1412  T+29:38 Speltra top sep from EPS 
 1423  EPS purging 524 x 27000  
 1420?  EPC reentry  
1997 Nov 2  0830  TEAMSAT end of transmission 

Payload:

  • VTS Visual Telemetry System, camera

  • FPE Flux Probe experiment, atomic oxygen concentration

  • AVS Autonomous Vision System, for navigation and imaging
1997-066B

MAQSAT-B (Maquette - bas) was developed for the Ariane 502 test launch. The dummy satellite was built by Kayser-Threde of Munchen. An inverted cone with a mass of 1400 kg, it is placed below the SPELTRA and MAQSAT-H. MAQSAT-B has less instrmentation than MAQSAT-H. The lower SPELTRA section has an ACU (satellite adapter unit) mounted on top of the Ariane 5 VEB/EPS. MAQSAT-B has a length of 1.10m, the inverted cone pointing downward. Above MAQSAT-B is the SBS adapter, and above that is the dummy mass replacing the 550 kg AMSAT-DL Phase III-D satellite. Phase III-D and SBS total 630 kg.

Maqsat-B remained attached to the EPS stage.

Total mass is 2342 kg.

Payload:

  • SBS Specific bearing structure 83 kg

  • MaqSBS Additional support ring 105 kg

  • Amsat Ballast to replace Amsat Phase 3D sat

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