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This paper describes the Thermal Balance test that has been performed on EuTEF (European Technology Exposure Facility) platform, to be flown in October 2007 as an attached payload of Columbus module to the ISS. The thermal control system of EuTEF is based on a passive concept, with several different payloads being each one a self-standing technological experiment, with a centralized power supply and data handling. Each instrument has its own TCS, independent one another: they are individually insulated by MLI. The test has been performed with EuTEF Flight Model (FM) on the Passive Attach System to have representative thermal flight-like interfaces. Simulation of close-to-real flight environmental heat loads have been accomplished in a vacuum chamber (at INTESPACE, Toulouse-F) by means of a solar beam and a spin table suitably oriented to simulate a critical identified orbit, among all the possible on the ISS.

The Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer (AMS) is a particle physics detector designed to measure charged cosmic rays spectra and high energy photons on board of the International Space Station (ISS). The large acceptance (0.5 m2sr), the long mission duration (3 years) and the state of the art particle identification techniques will allow AMS to provide the most sensitive search up to date for the existence of anti matter nuclei and for the origin of dark matter. AMS02 now is in its final integration phase at CERN. To verify the functional performance of the detectors and of the key subsystems of the Thermal Control System under vacuum condition and to validate the thermal mathematical model of AMS02 a system level thermo-vacuum test will be performed in the Large Space Simulator (LSS) of ESA at ESTEC (the Netherlands).

The AMS-02 experiment is a space-born instrument designed to perform high precision measurements of cosmic rays and γ-ray fluxes on board of the International Space Station (ISS). All the components of the AMS experiment are designed to withstand the mechanical stresses in the launch phase and to operate in vacuum in a wide range of temperatures. In order to verify the performance of the hardware in harsh conditions like the flight ones, all the components of the AMS instruments undergo a severe qualification procedure before the integration into the detector. In this paper, we will report on the thermo-vacuum tests on the L-TOF (Lower Time of Flight) and ECAL (Electromagnetic CALorimeter) detectors, successfully performed in the SERMS laboratory in June and September 2006, respectively.

Four different thermal-vacuum tests were performed on AMICA Star Tracker (AST) in the period March-July 2006 in the space simulator of the SERMS laboratory in Terni-Italy. Each of these tests was designed to verify different AST camera design features. The Thermal Balance test was conceived to validate the thermo-elastic model of the instrument and the active and passive thermal control subsystems. The Thermal Vacuum Cycling test was conceived to validate the AST electronics operative and survival temperature limits under vacuum conditions. The worst hot and cold operative and survival limits of the lens and filters in the AST optical system were assessed by means of the “Sun in the lens” and Lens Cold tests.

This paper reports on the approach followed for the TCS verification of the payload AMS-02 (Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer), aiming at the qualification of the entire system, in steps, for the space environment. AMS-02 is a state-of-the-art experiment composed by a stack of seven different particle detectors, each of them having its own electronics and control equipments. It will be installed on the International Space Station Starboard segment S3 of the main Truss, and will be a 6500 kg payload, with a power consumption of 2000 W. The verification philosophy is driven by the need to qualify the flight hardware and by the necessary confirmation and correlation of the thermal mathematical models, based on experimental data. The hardware used on AMS-02 is derived from the state-of-the-art ground based detectors for high energy physics, hence not yet proven for operations in vacuum and in extreme thermal environment.

The thermal vacuum / thermal balance test design and execution are described in the paper for the qualification campaign of 37 electronic units flown with the payload of ISS (International Space Station), i.e., AMS-02 (Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer). The tests are run in 10 separate test campaigns, across a time frame of 3 years (2002–2005). The tests have been carried on at NSPO (National Space Program Office in Taiwan), maximizing the time usage of thermal vacuum facilities. During each experimental campaign several units are tested at the same time, sharing the vacuum chamber volume. Because independent heaters are applied to each unit, the electronic crates can be tested at temperature levels different from one another. The reliability of thermal analysis is enhanced at each thermal balance test, with the final aim to fully validate the thermal mathematical model deviating less than 3°C from actual measurements.