Cislunar Autonomous Positioning System Technology Operations and Navigation Experience, or CAPSTONE, are cubes that fly in a unique orbit around the Moon for NASA’s future Artemis Lunar Outpost portal. Her six-month mission will help usher in a new era of deep space exploration. Credit: NASA Ames Research Center
On Friday, October 7, Capstone crew members successfully performed an operation to stop the spacecraft’s rotation. This removes a major obstacle to returning the spacecraft to normal operations.
Following the course correction maneuver scheduled for September 8, CAPSTONE ran into a problem Put the spacecraft into safe mode. soon find out The spacecraft was spinning The internal reaction goes beyond the chakras’ ability to control and resist. According to the spacecraft’s data, the problem may be related to a valve in one of the spacecraft’s eight thrusters. Partially open valve indicates thrust as false thrust is generated whenever the thrust system is depressed. After a thorough review of telemetry and simulation data, the mission team performed several tests on the spacecraft to develop a plan to stop the spacecraft’s rotation despite this problem.
On Friday morning, rescue orders were activated. According to preliminary telemetry and tracking data from the Coronation, it appears that the maneuver was successful, indicating that the spacecraft stopped its rotation and regained full control of the three-axis position. This means that the CAPSTONE position can be controlled without unplanned rotation. CAPSTONE now directs its solar arrays toward the sun to increase energy production. It has also modified the pointing of its antennas to provide better data communication with the ground.
The risks of this anomaly and the recovery process are significant, and the team worked extensively and collaboratively to reduce these risks. In the coming days, the team will continue to monitor the spacecraft’s condition and make any necessary changes to procedures to account for and mitigate the effects of the partially open thrust valve. The staff will also attempt to design possible solutions to this valve issue to reduce the risk of future maneuvers.
CAPSTONE is on its way to enter a straight-target halo orbit around the moon on November 13.
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