Navigator (satellite bus)
Navigator is a satellite bus from the Russian manufacturer Lavochkin . It was used for the first time in the Elektro-L 1 weather satellite launched in 2011 and is to be used primarily for scientific missions in the future.
technology
The Navigator bus has an empty weight of 850–980 kg and can hold up to 540 kg of fuel. An electrical output of 600–1150 watts can be provided for the maximum payload of 2600 kg. There are four reaction wheels for position stabilization . Only three are required, so one of them can fail without affecting operations. Orbit corrections are made with four control engines with 5 Newtons of thrust each ; Another eight small engines, each with a thrust of 0.5 Newtons, control the spatial alignment of the satellite.
commitment
The navigator bus is designed to be very flexible so that it can be used for as many missions as possible. It is equally suitable for satellites in low earth orbit and for space telescopes at the L 2 libration point 1.5 million kilometers away .
Usage examples:
- Elektro-L , a type of geostationary weather satellite that has been in use since 2011. Not all systems of the bus worked as plannedin the first example .
- RadioAstron (Spektr-R), a space telescope launched in 2011for interferometric observations in the radio range . It is in very high and highly elliptical earth orbit of 23,000 km × 315,000 km. The telescope has been out of service since 2019 because communication with the ground station has completely failed. The planned minimum service life of five years has thus been exceeded.
- Spektr-RG , a Russian-German X-ray observatory that has beenstationedin a Halo orbit around the L 2 point of the sun-earth system since 2019.
- Arktika-M , a type of weather and communications satellite under development. Several Arktika satellites are to be brought into highly elliptical orbits measuring 1,000 km × 40,000 km.
- Spectrum-UV , a planned UV space telescope. It is to bestationedin a geosynchronous orbit .
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b Stefan Heykes: Elektro-L successfully put into operation. In: Raumfahrer.net. January 22, 2011, accessed September 19, 2019 .
- ↑ a b The Navigator satellite bus on the Russian Space Web, accessed September 19, 2019.
- ↑ Spektr-R on N2YO.com, accessed September 21, 2019.
- ^ Anatoly Zak: Russia to build Arctic satellite network. In: russianspaceweb.com. Retrieved September 21, 2019 .