Solar array is the only power source for satellite and III-V solar cells are the most commonly used devices in space by now. However, the brittleness of GaAs solar cells as well as the rigid nature of aluminum substrate for microsatellite restrict the high reliability and the large-scale manufacture of satellite. In this paper, we proposed a strategy to fundamentally reduce the strain of aluminum based solar wing substrates by inserting local fixed points. We applied the simulation calculation to determine the optimal solution to cut down aluminum substrate deformation during the thermal cycling and further performed experiment to measure the ultimate deformation of III-V solar cells. We found that approximately 50% of the total substrate strain was decreased by inserting local fixed threaded holes. We experimentally got the bending deflection of 3.10 mm for space solar cells, and found that the simulating deformation for cells on the solar arrays in space condition is only 7.42% of the solar cell bending deflection from experiment. Besides, increasing the reinforced rib thickness is also a way to reduce the deformation. The deformation improvement through inserting fixed points enables the flexible operation during the overall design stage, decreases the stress to solar cells from the original sources, and solves the problem of large solar cell strain fundamentally, which paves way for the effective manufacture of low cost, long-life, and high efficiency microsatellite and minisatellite.

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Deformation Control of Space Solar Array by Design Improvement

  • Maoshu Yin,
  • Yilin Liang,
  • Jin Li,
  • Haifeng Chen,
  • Ruixian Wang,
  • Meng Xie,
  • Jun Xu,
  • Hongdong Yang

摘要

Solar array is the only power source for satellite and III-V solar cells are the most commonly used devices in space by now. However, the brittleness of GaAs solar cells as well as the rigid nature of aluminum substrate for microsatellite restrict the high reliability and the large-scale manufacture of satellite. In this paper, we proposed a strategy to fundamentally reduce the strain of aluminum based solar wing substrates by inserting local fixed points. We applied the simulation calculation to determine the optimal solution to cut down aluminum substrate deformation during the thermal cycling and further performed experiment to measure the ultimate deformation of III-V solar cells. We found that approximately 50% of the total substrate strain was decreased by inserting local fixed threaded holes. We experimentally got the bending deflection of 3.10 mm for space solar cells, and found that the simulating deformation for cells on the solar arrays in space condition is only 7.42% of the solar cell bending deflection from experiment. Besides, increasing the reinforced rib thickness is also a way to reduce the deformation. The deformation improvement through inserting fixed points enables the flexible operation during the overall design stage, decreases the stress to solar cells from the original sources, and solves the problem of large solar cell strain fundamentally, which paves way for the effective manufacture of low cost, long-life, and high efficiency microsatellite and minisatellite.