Preliminary ground correlation testing has been conducted with an 8 cm mercury ion thruster and diagnostic instrumentation replicating to a large extent the IAPS flight test hardware, configuration, and electrical grounding/isolation. Thruster efflux deposition retained at 25 C was measured and characterized. Thruster ion efflux was characterized with retarding potential analyzers. Thruster-generated plasma currents, the spacecraft common (SCC) potential, and ambient plasma properties were evaluated with a spacecraft potential probe (SPP). All the measured thruster/spacecraft interactions or their IAPS measurements depend critically on the SCC potential, which can be controlled by a neutralizer ground switch and by the SPP operation.
Ground Correlation Investigation of Thruster Spacecraft Interactions to Be Measured on the IAPS Flight Test
1984
36 pages
Report
Keine Angabe
Englisch
IAPS (8-cm) ion thruster cyclic endurance test
NTRS | 1984
|Spacecraft for ion thruster flight tests
Engineering Index Backfile | 1964
|