A technique is presented to test heat pipe equipped spacecraft under any operational sun angle and orientation without adversely affecting the S/C power and temperature distribution that can occur when heat pipes are tilted in a 1-g test environment. The proposed technique is based on a specially designed heater system to simulate the heat pipe performance (i.e. distribution of thermal flux and temperature). The heater system employs temperature predictions generated by computer simulation and a mathematical correlation of the performance of real and simulated heat pipes when operated similarly in a horizontal position.
A Heat Pipe Simulation Technique for Spacecraft Thermal Testing Under Variable Orientation
Sae Technical Papers
Intersociety Conference on Environmental Systems ; 1982
1982-02-01
Conference paper
English
Thermal performance of embedded heat pipe spacecraft radiator panels
Tema Archive | 1993
|Thermal Performance of Embedded Heat Pipe Spacecraft Radiator Panels
SAE Technical Papers | 1993
|