Space Borne Cooling Systems

Assignment
Heat Transfer in Space Applications
By-Gaurav
Space borne Cooling Systems

Some spacecraft payloads require cooling to low temperatures.
The most common types of cooled instruments include IR-sensor
focal planes and optics, as well as Low-noise amplifiers for RF
receivers.
Several devices are available for cooling such applications, including
radiators, stored-cryogen cooling systems, and refrigerators.
The Defense Support Program (DSP) satellite uses a system of
radiators to cool the optics and focal plane.
Parts in DSP sensor
1. Thermoelectric coolers
2. Helium circulators
3. Phase Change Materials (PCM) canisters
4. Forward facing radiators (FFR)
5. TCS electronics unit and power supply
Concept Helium circulator transports focal plane/PCM heat to nonsolar
illuminated forward-facing radiator (FFR)
Circulator turned off when FFR solar illuminated-focal plane heat
melts PCM
PCM is refrozen when circulator resumed refrozen when circulator
resumed
Working: The optical elements (mirrors) and the telescope enclosure and
baffles are cooled passively by covering the telescope enclosure
with low-absorptance, high-emittance quartz mirrors.
Cooling the optics and enclosure reduces the amount of IR
radiation emitted from those surfaces.
Assignment
By-Gaurav
Without this cooling, the sensors at the focal plane would not be
able to see their targets over the IR "noise" created by the telescope
itself.
The focal-plane assembly is connected to a phase-change-material
(PCM) heat sink and a passive radiator by a pumped-helium loop.
The operating principle of this system is the transporting of heat
from the focal plane and PCM to the radiator by means of a
pumped-helium loop during the half of the orbit when the sun does
not shine on the radiator. During the other half-orbit, solar
illumination heats the radiator to temperatures well above those of
the focal plane.
To avoid a focal plane temperature rise, the helium circulation is
shut off, effectively decoupling the radiators, and the heat loads
from the focal plane are stored in the PCM.
When the sun moves behind the vehicle, the circulator is turned
back on to reject the focal-plane heat and the excess heat stored in
the PCM.
Minimizing heat leaks into the forward-facing radiator by the use
of MLI and low-conductance supports on the back side is critical
to achieving low-temperature performance.
Even small heat leaks into the radiator during the shadowed halforbit can raise its temperature considerably from 173 K. (Because
of the T 4 nature of radiation-heat transfer, only one-fifth as much
heat is needed to raise radiator equilibrium temperatures one
degree at 173 K than at room temperature.)
For lower-temperature radiators the sensitivity is even greater; for
example, the sensitivity is greater by a factor of 50 at 80 K than at
room temperature. For this reason, low-temperature radiators are
extremely sensitive to heat loads from the environment or heat
leaks from the spacecraft.)
Assignment
By-Gaurav
Devices requiring cooling to very low temperatures and having

limited lifetime requirements (less than 1 or 2 years) usually employ
stored-cryogen cooling systems. Designs for such devices use a
cryogenic fluid or solid stored in a debar as a heat sink to absorb
waste heat from the device and maintain it at a low temperature. An
example of such a system is the Infrared Astronomical Satellite
(IRAS). The cryogen in this case is 70 kg of helium stored at 1.85 K
in a tank that is wrapped around the satellite's telescope assembly.
Spacecraft Cryogenic Cooling

The HgCdTe detector arrays are required to be cooled to 80K during
operation. A number of methods for producing cryogenic temperatures
in spacecraft have been used in the past and were considered for CIRS
(composite infrared spectrometer).
1. Stored Cryogens
The simplest way of attaining cryogenic temperatures on a spacecraft is
to carry a dewar of a cryogenic material in either liquid or solid form.
The detectors to be cooled would then be mounted on the wall of the
dewar to use the cryogen as a heat sink. Suitable cryogens could be for
example solid argon or liquid helium. The temperature at which the
cryogen boils or sublimes is varied by throttling the exhaust valve to
vary the pressure above the cryogen.
This method of cooling was used successfully by the CLAES
instrument on the UARS spacecraft. Stored cryogen coolers are
unsuitable for use on the Cassini mission because of the extremely long
mission duration - CLAES was a heavy, earth orbiting instrument which
still had only an 18 month lifetime so making a stored cryogen system
which would weigh only 2.5kg (the mass of the CIRS cooler) and which
would have sufficient life time for the Cassini mission would be
impractical.
Assignment
By-Gaurav
2. Mechanical Coolers
A number of mechanical coolers have been flown to produce 80K
temperatures on space borne instruments for example the ISAMS
instrument on UARS used two Stirling cycle coolers producing
approximately 800mW of cooling at 80K. They consumed
approximately SOW of electrical power and weighed over 4kg. This
level of cooling is considerably more than the 200mW total cooling
power needed for the CIRS 80K stage.
The mechanical coolers currently available commercially have
an operating lifetime which is too short for use on Cassini, and would
create vibration problems on CIRS. A large amount of development
work would therefore be required to reduce the power requirement and
increase the operating life time to levels usable in the outer solar system.
3. Radiative Coolers
Radiative coolers are simple passive cooling devices. The principle of
operation is that a high emissivity radiator is directed towards space
which has an effective temperature of approximately 4K and an
emissivity of unity.
For deep space missions radiative coolers have a number of
advantages over the other types of coolers discussed for cooling
detectors: They require no electrical power to provide cooling. This is
especially important in the outer solar system where solar arrays
are not usable so the electrical power must be provided by thermal
generators (RTG's).
There are no moving parts, giving an effectively unlimited
lifetime. The main limitation is the degradation of the surfaces due
to contamination or radiation.
Their mass is significantly lower than an equivalent stored cryogen
cooling system.

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Heat Transfer in Space Applications