NASA’s twin Radiation Belt Storm Probe spacecraft underwent lengthy and rigorous testing at APL prior to shipping to the Kennedy Space Center on May 1, 2012.
Shown here are:
-Solar array deployment testing
-The propulsion water load test, in which water, instead of propellant, is loaded into the spacecraft for testing purposes
-The stacked vibration test to simulate the physical rigors of launch on the two stacked spacecraft
-The separation system shock test, which tests the separation of the two RBSP spacecraft from each other after reaching orbit
- Launch Vehicle/spacecraft B separation system shock test, which tests the separation of the B spacecraft from the launch vehicle after reaching orbit
- Whip boom deployment test (deploying one of the EFW instrument booms)
- Thermal vacuum system test, which simulates the airless environment and extreme temperature fluctuations in which RBSP will operate on orbit
More information on RBSP is available at https://rbsp.jhuapl.edu/ and https://www.nasa.gov/rbsp.
Post time: Jul-01-2017