Sparkwing to provide solar panels for software defined satellite
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MDA Space has selected the Airbus Sparkwing solar panels for its latest software defined satellite.
Airbus will supply 200 the Airbus Sparkwing solar panels for the MDA Aurora satellite set to launch
The Sparkwing solar arrays will be built on a designated line at Airbus’ high-capacity production facility in Leiden, the Netherlands. The solar array is the largest Sparkwing to date, consisting of two wings with five panels each and providing a photovoltaic area of well over 30 sqm.
The MDA AURORA supply chain will help support product deliveries for anchor customer Telesat’s Low Earth Orbit (LEO) satellite constellation Lightspeed, a global network that will bring enterprise-class connectivity to customers worldwide.
Sparkwing is the first commercially available, off-the-shelf solar array for small satellites says Airbus, having been originally optimised for Low Earth Orbit missions that require power levels between 100W and 2000W.
There are over thirty different panel dimensions, configurable into deployable wings with one, two or three panels per wing, with single actuation need (due to only one hold-down per wing). In the meantime, its application range has grown to cover also higher power demands and more and larger panels per wing for missions to LEO and beyond.
Next to power generation, the solar array product provides a high stiffness, minimal integration effort (made for integration by the customer) and benign demands on the satellite sidewall tolerances.
“Our industrialised Sparkwing solar array product not only meets the demands of this ground-breaking constellation project, but is also tailored to ensure optimal performance in space. The Sparkwing solar arrays are designed for series production, ideally suited for constellations, and we will accordingly contribute to a project enabling space connectivity,” said Rob Postma, Managing Director of Airbus in the Netherlands.
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