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- All Subjects: engineering
- Member of: Barrett, The Honors College Thesis/Creative Project Collection
Description
The Phoenix CubeSat is a 3U Earth imaging CubeSat which will take infrared (IR) photos of cities in the United Stated to study the Urban Heat Island Effect, (UHI) from low earth orbit (LEO). It has many different components that need to be powered during the life of its mission. The only power source during the mission will be its solar panels. It is difficult to calculate power generation from solar panels by hand because of the different orientations the satellite will be positioned in during orbit; therefore, simulation will be used to produce power generation data. Knowing how much power is generated is integral to balancing the power budget, confirming whether there is enough power for all the components, and knowing whether there will be enough power in the batteries during eclipse. This data will be used to create an optimal design for the Phoenix CubeSat to accomplish its mission.
ContributorsBarakat, Raymond John (Author) / White, Daniel (Thesis director) / Kitchen, Jennifer (Committee member) / Electrical Engineering Program (Contributor, Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2017-05
Description
This paper describes the research done to attempt to scale up thrusts produced by ionic wind thrusters, or "lifters" to magnitudes needed to power a 2 kg hobbyist remote-control airplane. It includes background information on the Biefeld-Brown effect and the thrust it produces, an experiment that attempted to prove that thrust can be scaled up from smaller ionic wind thrusters to larger scales, and two models predicting thruster geometries and power sources needed to reach these thrusts. An ionic wind thruster could not be created that would power the hobbyist remote as a high-voltage power source with voltage and power high enough could not be obtained. Thrusters were created for the experiment using balsa wood, aluminum foil, and thin copper wire, and were powered using a 30 kV transformer. The thrusters attempted to test for correlations between thrust, electrode length, and current; electric field strength, and thrust; and thrust optimization through opening up air flow through the collector electrode. The experiment was inconclusive as all the thrusters failed to produce measurable thrust. Further experimentation suggests the chief failure mode is likely conduction from the collector electrode to the nearby large conductive surface of the scale.
ContributorsHaug, Andrew James (Author) / White, Daniel (Thesis director) / Takahashi, Timothy (Committee member) / Middleton, James (Committee member) / Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Program (Contributor) / Department of Military Science (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2017-12