AOCS telemetry open data of the TechnoSat small satellite mission

Introduction

Telemetry data from the TechnoSat small satellite from TU Berlin, from its launch on 14.07.2017 until 31.12.2025.

Nomenclature

AOCS
Attitude and Orbit Control System

COG
Center Of Gravity

FLX
Fluxgate magnetometer

FOR
Fiber Optic Rate sensor

GPS
Global Positioning System

LRR
Laser Retroreflector

MFS
Magnetic Field Sensor (MEMS)

MOI
Moment Of Inertia

MTS
Magnetorquer System

RWS
Reaction Wheel System

SAT
Satellite body-fixed coordinate system

SLR
Satellite Laser Ranging

SSU
Sun Sensor Unit

STR
Star Tracker

TOD
True Of Date (Earth-centered inertial) coordinate system

Satellite coordinate system

See drawing at SAT_axes.jpg to see the axis convention.

Spacecraft properties

The file sc_properties_TE.yaml contains the following spacecraft properties:

Key
Description

norad
Norad ID

sic
Satellite Identification Code, a 4 digit satellite descriptor. See Consolidated Laser Ranging Data Format

cospar
COSPAR ID

mass
Spacecraft mass in kg

moi
3*1 array, principal values of inertia in SAT frame in kg/m^2

q_SAT_from_MOI
4*1 array representing the quaternion for the transformation from MOI to SAT frame

cog
3*1 array, COG position in SAT frame in meters

Laser retroreflectors (LRRs)

The file lrr_positions_TE.csv contains the position and orientation of the LRRs. The data format is the following:

Column names
Description

name
Name of the LRR

pos_sat_mm_[x,y,z]
Position of the LRR [x,y,z] in SAT frame in millimeters

[v_sat_x, v_sat_y, v_sat_z]
Mounting direction (convention: towards the outside) of the LRR in SAT frame; Unitless, unit vector

Python environment

A uv-based Python environment is available at pyproject.toml .

A Jupyter notebook example to load and plot some telemetry data is available at plotting.ipynb