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Full-Text Articles in Engineering
Performance Enhancement And Characterization Of An Electromagnetic Railgun, Paul M. Gilles
Performance Enhancement And Characterization Of An Electromagnetic Railgun, Paul M. Gilles
Master's Theses
Collision with orbital debris poses a serious threat to spacecraft and astronauts. Hypervelocity impacts resulting from collisions mean that objects with a mass less than 1g can cause mission-ending damage to spacecraft. A means of shielding spacecraft against collisions is necessary. A means of testing candidate shielding methods for their efficacy in mitigating hypervelocity impacts is therefore also necessary. Cal Poly’s Electromagnetic Railgun was designed with the goal of creating a laboratory system capable of simulating hypervelocity (≥ 3 km/s) impacts. Due to several factors, the system was not previously capable of high-velocity (≥ 1 km/s) tests. A deficient projectile …
The Effects Of Atomic Oxygen On Patch Antenna Performance And Lifetime, Max J. Barta
The Effects Of Atomic Oxygen On Patch Antenna Performance And Lifetime, Max J. Barta
Master's Theses
The space environment is a volatile and challenging place for satellites to survive in. For Low Earth Orbiting (LEO) satellites, atomic oxygen (AO) is a constant corrosive effect that degrades the outer surface of satellites over long durations. Atomic oxygen exists in the atmosphere between 180 and 675 km and has a relatively high energy at 4.5 eV, which allows AO to break molecular bonds in materials on the surfaces of spacecraft. As the number and complexity of CubeSat missions increase, there is an increased risk that AO degradation on commercial off the shelf parts (COTS), such as antenna, could …