Project ideation

The Orbital Locker project aims to develop a satellite payload containing modular CubeSat components, which would be stored on-orbit and be ready for on-demand assembly into a multi-module satellite by a Cartesian gantry robot. The gantry robot consists of the traditional linear axes that allow for motion in the X, Y, and Z direction, with an electromagnetic gripper at the bottom of the Z-axis that is used to pick up and place the CubeSat modules. On orbit, the locker will have the capability to assemble and rapidly deploy multiple satellites as the need arises, such as for natural disaster quick response, or to custom equip satellites for strategic placements around other space assets. The robot, its actuators, and the modules themselves are designed from the ground-up to be space compatible. A simplified assembly process is shown in Fig. 1.

Fig. 1. Assembly process.

Below we have an illustration of the mission Concept of Operations. The robot is inside a plexiglass housing to prevent modules from flying out of containment. Modules are progressivly stacked and are then pushed out of the robot build volume and allowed to freefloat within the housing (Fig. 2).

Fig. 2. Module illustration without (L) and with (R) deployment of modules.

Key modifications to work within the zero-G flight are:

• The assembly takes place in 15 second increments during the microgravityu portions of the flight

• An accelerometer to initiate the ‘next move’ in the sequence when zero-g is achieved (e.g. <0.1 G) and stops the current move when zero-g ends (e.g. >0.2 G)