The objectives of the project are:
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support all AIT tasks
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environmental testing of payloads and satellite (thesis can focus on TVAC, Mechanical…)
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Test report for environmental qualification campaigns.
We are building a CubeSat that shall be launched end of 2027: CENSSAT-1. For this CubeSat, CENSSS is also responsible for Assembly, Integration and Test (AIT) of both the satellite bus and all payloads. In 2026/2027, the CENSSAT-1 team therefor needs help in building and testing/qualifying an actual satellite. This thesis project brings you as close to flight hardware as possible. The tasks include support of the satellite and payload assembly, design and planning of environmental qualification tests, such as mechanical stress tests (vibration and shock) and thermal-vacuum tests (TVAC), analysis of the test data and comparison with existing simulation models. Optionally, this thesis also could include the update of finite element models for mechanical and thermal stress analysis.
If more than one student is interested in this topic, we split the focus of the theses afterwards, either for different environmental tests, or focus on certain subsystems/payload tests.
This project is suitable for 60 credits.