SPACE PROCESSING APPLICATIONS PAYLOAD EQUIPMENT STUDY VOL.Ⅱ E. COMMERCIAL EQUIPMENT UTILITY

摘要

Examination of commercial equipment technologies revealed that the functional performance requirements of space processing equipment could generally be met by state-of-the-art design practices. Thus, an apparatus could be evolved from a standard item or derived by custom design using present technologies. About 15 percent of the equipment needed has no anal¬ogous commercial base of derivation and requires special development. This equipment 1s involved primarily with contactless heating and position control.nThe derivation of payloads using commercial equipment sources provides a broad and potentially cost-effective base upon which to draw. The derivation of payload equipment from commercial technologies poses other issues beyond that of the Identifiable functional performance, but preliminary results on testing of selected equipment testing appear quite favorable.nDuring this phase of the SPA study, several aspects of commercial equip-ment utility were assessed and considered. These included safety, packaging and structural, power conditioning (electrical/electronic), thermal and materials of construction. In considering the impart of using commercial equipment in the Spacelab, it was found convenient to draw-up acceptance criteria which could be used 1n the analysis of the problem areas involved wit specific items of equipment. These criteria were based in part upon certain assumptions of the Spacelab's operations which were taken 1n part from the referenced documents in Section 7. These assumptions do not in some instances necessarily represent present or future NASA plans. Changes in these are expected as the program progresses and these changes may in turn necessitate corresponding changes in the restrictions and requirements that have been developed.