Questions tagged [cubesat]
Type of satellite in the shape of a cube 10 cm on each side. Popular with academics and amateurs with a focus on off-the-shelf components.
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What is the average solar irradiation in low earth orbit?
I am trying to figure out how much power I can expect for a CubeSat in Low Earth Orbit. Is there some dataset or constant that describes the average rate of solar irradiation (per unit of area) in LEO?...
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Has a cubesat ever caused a problem for another spacecraft? Examples? Close calls?
Cubesats can pose some unique challenges; they are small and so potentially a little harder to track, have larger area/mass so more subject to forces that can change their trajectories, are often less ...
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Are LHCP L-Band antennas for Cubesats available?
I am designing a cubesat to carry out GNSS reflectometry or GNSS-R. To collect the earth reflected signals, I need a nadir pointing array of patch antennas, with Left Hand Circular Polarisation (LHCP) ...
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What is a good SNR value for a chipsat in LEO using bpsk?
My team and I are working on a chipsat and we are planning on launching it to LEO, we've also planned using bpsk.
However our use case is a bit different, all we need once it is in LEO is a ...
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How does a 22 dBi X-band "patch" antenna get so much gain and how well behaved is its high-gain radiation pattern?
@NgPh's answer to How will the LICIACube cubesat transmit DART impact images back to Earth? What kind of antenna and radio will it use? quotes LICIACube on DART mission: an asteroid impact captured by ...
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How will the LICIACube cubesat transmit DART impact images back to Earth? What kind of antenna and radio will it use?
MarCO
The Mars Cube Ones or MarCOs were 6U cubesats that were deployed in deep space during the InSight mission to observe it during a critical, dynamic period of its mission, in this case the N ...
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How well does wood thermally perform in space applications?
Wondering if there are any studies about using wood as a material for insulation in spacecraft? My specific question is does anyone have any experience with it working as an insulator? I remember a ...
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Methods and techniques for correction for atmospheric effects
What are methods and pieces of hardware which can limit these effects?
In one of the last my question, User Polar_Bear mentioned, but there are many methods and pieces of hardware which can limit ...
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There are only a few suppliers of optical terminals: what is the reason?
I am conducting research into optical free space communication and small/nano satellites in LEO. I have found only a few companies which supply lasercom (laser communication) terminals (transmitter/...
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Number of satellites needed for global 4-fold coverage as a function of altitude?
I want to estimate how many satellites (and how many number of planes) are needed for achieving a 4-fold global coverage on earth (global coverage with at least 4 satellites in view in each location). ...
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Antenna for receivers
I am designing a CubeSat 6U in which I am using Software Defined Radio with SIGINT capability as my payload. The payload has 3 reception ports and 2 transmission ports and hence transceiver or ...
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Why put SunRISE in the graveyard? Why will it "fly slightly above geosynchronous orbit"?
The blots.nasa.gov article NASA’s SunRISE Mission Studying Solar Particle Storms Moves Toward Launch says that the upcoming
SunRISE mission — short for the Sun Radio Interferometer Space Experiment — ...
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What is actually happening in this full mission rehearsal of CAPSTONE's propulsion hardware?
NASA Ames's feature CAPSTONE’s CubeSat Prepares for Lunar Flight says
CAPSTONE will use a hydrazine-fueled propulsion system during most of its three- to four- month journey to the Moon. This line of ...
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How will NEA Scout control its attitude during deep space flight & keep its camera steady without vibrations or damage to its 85 m² solar sail?
Phil Plait's Bad Astronomy's Fly Me to the Moon and Then to a Near-Earth Asteroid describes Near Earth Asteroid Scout (NEA Scout, or just Scout) a 6U cubesat that will be deployed from Artemis ...
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Has Demonstrator-1 2021-006BX demonstrated a hydrogen-oxygen combustion engine fueled by electrolysis yet?
NASA's NASA CubeSat to Demonstrate Water-Fueled Moves in Space says:
A NASA CubeSat will launch into low-Earth orbit to demonstrate a new type of propulsion system. Carrying a pint of liquid water as ...
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Cubesat half duplex communication stack
My understanding is that in half duplex transceivers, you are only able to either transmit or receive. In Cubesats using half duplex comms, which part of their communications stack is performing the ...
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Could a satellite use a Miniature Atomic Clock (MAC) to provide GPS services?
I've been investigating GPS satellites and I got curious about onboard atomic clocks. I found this following paper on the concept of a CubeSat GPS constellation using Chip-Scale Atomic Clocks, and ...
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Advantages/disadvantages of wood for surface of cubesat?
Generally aluminum and kapton are the exterior surfaces of a cubesat. A Finnish/ESA cubesat, the WISA/Woodsat was launched that has plywood panels. It has protection against offgassing and very low ...
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Cubesat surface material
In wikipedia I read that the structure of the cubesat are made of aluminum alloys of 7075, 6061, 5005, and 5052. Is this the surface layer of the satellite or it is necessary to cover it with kapton ...
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Has there ever been a deliberate "Find A Satellite" challenge?
Companies often offer rewards for finding security issues in their products or their own IT systems, and hackathons have a long history.
I'm just wondering if there has ever been a deliberate ...
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Could a single CubeSat provide location services on another celestial body such as Mars? Could a constellation do it?
From my understanding, by having two satellites emit a signal simultaneously (carrying atomic clocks to achieve it), a ground device could measure the difference in times of arrival to determine its ...
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Are there cubesat fan clubs? Does anybody besides their owners pay attention to them, look for or listen for them via radio?
I know the title sounds harsh, but I think it's a valid question. Public outreach and education/inspiration of the next generation has always been a part of spaceflight, and cubesats seemed to be one ...
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When ISS Launches Cubesats, which direction do they usually fire them?
I was listening to Houston We Have A Podcast and they mentioned that spare payload on ISS supply/crew runs frequently get filled with cubesats which get (more elegantly than the word suggests) tossed ...
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How much would it cost to launch a 0.5U Satellite?
I have seen the figures for 1U, 3U and 12U Satellites such as those provided here, but I have been unable to find pricing for the launch of a single 0.5U or 0.25U satellite.
I have seen many academic ...
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How do cubesat owners first find out their cubesat's initial trajectory? How do they point antennas at it before official TLEs start to appear?
When cubesats are first deployed it can sometimes take several days before they start appearing in official TLE distributions, and even then if many were deployed it may take a lot more work to decide ...
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Did the MarCo cubesats photograph each other or the Centaur stage from which they were deployed?
The screenshot below is an artists rendering of two MarCo cubesats and a Centaur upper stage moving together in space. I'm wondering if either of the MarCos photographed the other or the upper stage ...
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Regulations for cubesats designed to survive reentry and be retrieved?
I'm currently thinking about the potential of manufacturing certain items (ZBLAN, Semiconductors, Organs, Drugs, etc.) in LEO and I want to know whether it would be possible/legal to design a cubesat ...
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Is there a widespread popular misconception of how expensive it is to launch a cubesat? [closed]
Sometimes one sees discussions about hypothetical CubeSats with impressive abilities that seem to be assume that CubeSats are cheaper to launch (not merely individually, but by mass) than larger ...
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What are the Basics of CubeSat Power Supplies and Systems?
I am going to go ahead and apologize for my ignorance surrounding this topic, as my background is Aerodynamics, and not Electrical Engineering. From what I understand, CubeSats typically generate ...
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How many sun sensors are required to find a cubesat's orientation
I have read how a sun sensor can help find the orientation of a spacecraft, but I wasn’t sure how many are required, e.g. if one is needed on each face of the Cubesat. (Any additional information is ...
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How many cubesat U's is CAPSTONE really?
Wikipedia's CAPSTONE(spacecraft); Spacecraft says:
The orbiter is a 12-unit CubeSat
but looking at the images in the new NASA video NASA 2021: Let's Go to the Moon I see artwork that shows Capstone ...
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Example of CubeSat Systems Architecture and Software Architecture
For a school project I'm required to research into the engineering methodology and process for a CubeSat. As such, I'm inquiring into if anyone has an example software and systems architecture for ...
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Chance of ceramic board surviving re-entry on 3U CubeSat?
We're building a 3U CubeSat and have concerns about a ceramic PCB used in one of our experiments. Since ceramics have such a high melting temperature, we're not sure if the heat transfer during re-...
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Docking cubesat in orbit - is it possible?
Would it be plausible to launch two or more cubsat's into orbit, and then have them dock together, allowing them to pack on more hardware and even fuel, broadening their capability? If it is possible, ...
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Small satellite launcher to LEO dedicated launch vehicle [duplicate]
well today i was thinking, why nobody do something like the SS-520 but comercial? a small rocket entry dedicated to launch a cubesat, that probably go to have a lot of adventages and probably is realy ...
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Closest distance at which cubesat (or comparable smallsat) has communicated with the Deep Space Network or any large 10+ meter dish? Cis-lunar ever?
Discussion below Will future deep space optical communications "ground stations" actually be in space, or on the ground? has got me wondering about the improbable situation where a giant ...
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How to get started with CubeSats
I am new both to CubeSats and to Stack Exchange.
I have recently started studying and planning on how to build a CubeSat, as cheaply as possible. I have read some blog posts and watched some videos, ...
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Land a cubesat on the moon with ion engine
Say I have a 3U cubesat with a BIT-3 ion thruster, an iodine tank and landing legs. Can it land on the Moon with just an ion thruster?
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S-Band transceiver schematics [closed]
I'm working on a cubesat, and I want to communicate in the S-Band, arround 2.4GHz. And I'm searching for schematics of a transceiver example with arround 35 dBm of output power. If any have a .pdf, ....
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Microwave drive for cubesats
Theory: how is this?
I was doing a lot of research about the EmDrive thruster, i find 50% papers says that it work and other 50% saying that the "thrust" is a product of the interaction with ...
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What are the most common practical design specifications for antenna in space?
I'm writing my thesis on antennas for small satellite applications (cubesats).
Apart from the electrical specifications related to the particular application there are also several other "...
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Pointing accuracy and relevant manoeuvers CUBESAT
How do you calculate or determine the pointng accuracy of your CUBESAT in sunlit-part and eclipse-part modes?
Also how do you determine the maximum roll/pitch/yaw angles and slew rate required in ...
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What is the largest proper cubesat?
The sizes of Cubesats are measured in "U" units of volume. Each U is nominally a cube of something like 10 to 12 cm on a side, depending on the specific deploying mechanism it's approved for....
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Is it possible to send a CubeSat to Saturn/Enceladus?
I was wondering if it is technologically possible to send a CubeSat/Nanosatellites or constellation of nanosatellites to explore the water vapor jets in the southern region of Enceladus in the Saturn ...
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Have there been any square 4U (2x2) cubesats?
How much did each MarCO 6U cubesat weigh? suggests that the density of a MarCO 6U cubesat might be as low as 0.75 g/cm^3 whereas I think they are usually about twice that.
That led me to speculate ...
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Essential sensors for cubesat ADCS
We are building a 3U satellite to orbit Earth and measure space debris.
Between gyroscope, GPS, IMU, magnetometer, Sun sensors and star tracker, which would be essential sensors for the ADCS?
Or ...
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How do phonesats stay cool?
To the question Can a smart phone function in space? this answer says
Multiple android based phone satellites have been launched into space. (At least six according to Wikipedia). I haven't looked ...
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Do deployments of multiple cubesats generally obey proposed guidelines such as 20 seconds or more between deployments at 5 m/s or faster?
This answer to What can be done in future mass-cubesat deploys to make them “less irksome” to orbital space debris experts? links to Space Traffic Safety: A New Self-Governance Approach for the ...
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Do a significant proportion of cubesats (or any at all) have articulated solar panels/sails which can be pointed at the Sun?
It appears that for early cubesats the solar panels were simply fixed flat to the sides of the spacecraft, and even deployable panels were not part of early cubesat designs.
Have a significant number ...
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Why would photon pressure be needed to keep ParkinsonSAT Spinning?
This answer to Can a satellite work like a radiometer? says (in part):
...the US Naval Academy cubesat ParkinsonSAT was designed with four faces asymmetrical, with solar panels offset to one side ...