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Arduino in Space

tigoeJuly 21st, 2009

Jim McGuire of the Stensat Group sent this report on what might be the most exteme environment that an Arduino’s been deployed in yet:

“In addition to the primary ISS construction mission, STS-127 is carrying two 19-inch spherical satellites scheduled for deployment on Mission Day 16. The two spheres, Castor and Pollux [http://eludium.stensat.org.nyud.net/ANDE/Main.html], are part of the Atmospheric Neutral Density Experiment (ANDE) that studies atmospheric perturbations in the LEO environment. Castor [http://eludium.stensat.org.nyud.net/ANDE/Castor.html] contains an ARM processor, while Pollux is running an Atmel ATMega CPU. Pollux [http://eludium.stensat.org.nyud.net/ANDE/Pollux.html] also contains student payloads developed with Arduino on Atmel AVRs. Both satellites transmit telemetry using the FX.25 FEC format [http://www.stensat.org.nyud.net/Docs/Docs.htm] developed by the Stensat guys [http://www.stensat.org.nyud.net/satellites.htm]. Many components are commercial-grade, purchased from Digikey. This is the second ANDE mission, following the successful deployment of MAA and FCal [http://www.usna.edu.nyud.net/Users/aero/bruninga/fcal.html] on STS-116 (both also flying commercial components.)”

Thanks Jim, for the report!

9 Responses to “Arduino in Space”

  1. bohne Says:

    We have a discussion about “Arduino in space” since march, look here: http://www.arduino.cc/cgi-bin/yabb2/YaBB.pl?num=1236996885

  2. tigoe Says:

    Doh! I totally missed that thread in the forum, thanks Andre!

  3. Shutter (David) Says:

    I am glad that Jim sent in some more detailed info tough. Some questions I could not answer are answered in here. I have been trying to get Ivan to post the info myself.

    I work for stensat/stenlight currently. Being 17 I have a lot to learn.
    P.S.
    I introduced stensat to arduino. When they opened up the project up to the school and herd we are using avr cores I asked if they herd of arduino.

  4. Zementblog » News (22. Juli ‘09) Says:

    […] Arduino im All? Ganz schön abgefahren! […]

  5. Ivan Galysh Says:

    The satellites will be deployed July 30 after the shuttle leaves the space station. For all the amateur radio folks, the satellites will transmit on 145.825 MHz. Pollux will transmit every 33 seconds while Castor every 30 seconds.

  6. Ivan Galysh Says:

    Your fired David. Quit bragging.

    The website listed in the article is all the info that can be released for now. The website will be updated when I can get more info out. I’m busy with building more satellites.

    We are proposing another student satellite so Arduino will be part of the development effort. With Arduino now supporting the Atmega1280 with four serial ports, Arduino may be used for flight software development on the flight computer also known as the Command/Telemetry Data Handler.

    David (Shutter) is a pretty bright kid. He will either be a significant contributor to society or an evil genius.

    Oh and I keep forgetting. This link to a cansat kit now uses Arduino for the software development. When I get a chance, I’ll work up a website with details plus schematics. Cansat is an educational tool for teaching basic satellite design and operations. Students assemble the kit, write the flight software, and launch it on a high power rocket. The cansat pops at peak altitude and floats down on a parachute. The time in the air simulates an orbital pass. Telemetry is transmitted during the flight.

    http://www.pratthobbies.com/proddetail.asp?prod=CANSAT-1

  7. Shutter (David) Says:

    I am swaying away from evil…
    Tough it is tempting at times, I learned to fight the urges off.

    I am currently working on a site with more detailed info about the payloads.
    When it is finished I will post the link here and on the forums.
    I hope to finish by the end of the week.

  8. Arduino in space! - machine quotidienne Says:

    […] (I’m guessing they meant to say “ATMega168″, instead “ATMega16″ ?) Read more on the project on the Stensat Group’s site. [via Arduino Blog] […]

  9. Make Starts a Challenge to Get Kids’ Projects Into Space « 883cjiq's Blog Says:

    […] Our first challenge is to develop inexpensive science kits that can be built in a classroom and sent on-board suborbital flights to conduct experiments. The experiments must fit within a Cubesat, a 10 cm x 10 cm x 10 cm module. It’s an opportunity to use off-the-shelf technology to design projects kits that students can build and see them actually get into space. Imagine: Arduinos in space. (There has already been one Arduino sent into space.) […]

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