Mechanical and Pneumatic Design and Testing of a Floating Module for Zero-gravity Motion Simulation

Close proximity operations demand an accurate control in a micro-gravity environment, hence they must be reproduced and simulated systematically. Consequently, laboratory tests are a crucial aspect to validate the performances of space systems. This paper presents the development of a floating pneumatic module, whose dimensions and mass are representative of a 12U CubeSat. The vehicle has been designed to perform planar low friction motion over a levelled table for docking experiments. The paper focuses on the pneumatic and mechanical designs and on the laboratory tests of the module. The pneumatic design regards the air-compressed pneumatic system. The major specifics have been determined by the requirement of performing a docking procedure by starting from a distance of 500 mm. The mechanical design has been guided by two main requirements. The first is the possibility to accommodate different docking systems (e.g.: docking port). The second is the possibility to control the position of the centre of mass of the module. Several tests have been performed to verify the capabilities of the vehicle, such as: (1) pneumatic tests to evaluate the thrust of the propulsion system through the execution of linear motions and (2) mechanical measurements with dedicated setups to improve the estimation of the position of the centre of mass from the CAD model of the system.