ASU Research E-Magazine: High-Tech Industry Helps Get ASUSat 1 Off the Ground

When Scott L. Webster said he would give ASUSat 1 a boost, he meant it literally. Webster's company, Orbital Sciences Corporation, plans to launch the ASU student-built satellite in March 1997 as a secondary payload from Vandenberg Air Force Base in southern California.

It was Webster, as president of OSC's Space Data Division in Chandler, who originally challenged ASU to push the limits of small-satellite development. Most satellites weigh about 3,000 pounds. OSC already is an industry leader in the development of low-cost satellites weighing 100 to 1,000 pounds.

Last April, OSC launched the first two satellites of the $100 million, 26-satellite ORBCOMM system. Once complete in 1997, ORBCOMM will allow customers to send and receive messages anywhere in the world through pocket-sized communicators.

OSC uses its unconventional Pegasus launch system to deliver satellites into low-Earth orbit. An OSC L-1011 aircraft will release the rocket carrying ASUSat 1 from an altitude of about 38,000 feet. After ignition, the three-stage rocket's independent guidance and flight control system will place the primary payload and ASUSat 1 into orbit 341 miles above the Earth.

More than a dozen other companies and organizations have also thrown their support behind ASUSat 1. The stellar list includes some of the Valley of the Sun's hottest high-technology companies:

Honeywell Satellite Systems Operation of Glendale
As many as 10 Honeywell engineers have provided continual advice by electronic mail, telephone, or face-to-face meetings. The Satellite Systems Operation provides sophisticated systems to the U.S. government and prime space contractors for use on the space shuttle, satellites, and other space vehicles.

Motorola Inc.
Advised the thermal, power, and communications subsystems teams. Donated computer circuits and radio transmitter-receivers. Motorola is the lead company in the Iridium project, a $3.4 billion, 66-satellite system that would provide a global link for hand-held portable telephones among its capabilities by 1998.

Intel Corporation of Chandler
Donated the 80C188EC microprocessor that will serve as the satellite's brain, along with test equipment. Intel produces many of the world's most advanced microelectronics products, including those behind the personal computer revolution.

Dynair Tech of Arizona
The aircraft maintenance business at Phoenix Sky Harbor Airport donated a large quantity of expensive carbon fiber composite material for the satellite bus. The company also hardened the material in its autoclave, a large, pressurized oven.

Additional support has come from ICI Fiberite Composites, Simula Inc., BekTek, Universal Propulsion Company, KinetX, Equipment Reliability Group, Bell Atlantic Cable, Photocomm Inc., Astro Aerospace, Trimble Navigation, Rockwell, SincLabs, AERL (Australia), NASA Space Grant Program, National Science Foundation, Jet Propulsion Laboratory, and AMSAT Organization.—Steve Koppes