Bevo 2

Spacecraft nº:

US spacecraft nº:

Launch data: Designation  41314 / 1998-067HQ Launch date  22 Jun 2015 Launch site  CC, SLC-40 Launch vehicle  Falcon-9 v1.1 Mission  Technology Launch platform  AggieSat 4, LEO Deployment date  29 Jan 2016 - 15:50? UT Earth orbit: Perigee / Apogee  399 x 408 km Eccentricity   Inclination  51.7 ° Period   min

Image courtesy of the SDL at The University of Texas at Austin, Texas

Description:

• Bevo 2 is an picosat mission of the University of Texas, s part of NASA Johnson Space Center’s LONESTAR-2 (Low-Earth Orbiting Navigation Experiment for Spacecraft Testing Autonomous Rendezvous and Docking) project.
• Bevo-2 being a 3-U cubesat integrated into AggieSat4, the combined spacecraft are to be delivered to JSC for launch as soft stowage on the SpaceX Dragon CRS-7 or 8 and release from the International Space Station (ISS) in 2015 via JSC’s new Cyclops release mechanism.
• The objectives for this mission include relative-navigation solutions, three-axis stabilization, intersatellite communications, DRAGON GPS system characterization, and visual capability. In addition, after release from ISS, system checkout, and stabilization, AggieSat4 will release Bevo-2 to begin pointing, tracking, and relative navigation operations. It is to Demonstrate three-axis attitude determination and control (within 2 degrees), collect DRAGON carrier phase GPS data, capture video of Bevo-2 release (Aerospace Corporation 2MP), compute and crosslink relative navigation solutions, track Bevo-2.
• The goal of this mission is to launch two satellites together that will separate in orbit and perform proximity operations, including taking pictures of each other.
• March 2016: The University of Texas BEVO-2 cubesat was apparently prematurely ejected from the TAMU AggieSat-4 payload shortly after the latter was deployed from ISS.