A DIC method for thermal micro-deformation measurement of satellite high stability composite structure in simulated space environment

Abstract

In order to ensure the stability and reliability of the entire satellite and onboard equipment indicators, the satellite highly stable structure can only produce small deformation or “near zero deformation” under the space on-orbit (thermal/vacuum) environment. The effective measurement and verification of its dimensional stability indicators directly determine the success or failure of the development of highly stable satellites. This work proposes a method for measuring the thermal deformation of highly stable satellite structures based on digital image correlation, (DIC), which designs a combined methodology of the digital image correlation measurement scheme, a measurement instrument protection method, a highly uniform temperature measurement and control system in the simulated space on-orbit thermal/vacuum environment. The methodology proposed in the work makes the digital image correlation measurement system suitable for space on-orbit measurement, and verifies that the measurement system can maintain high measurement accuracy. The research results indicate that this method can effectively solve the problems of measurement field interference, high uniform temperature control, speckle measurement camera, and measurement baseline protection. The thermal stability measurement experiment of a highly stable structure of a certain satellite has been successfully completed, and it has been verified that this method can meet the effectiveness and measurement accuracy of simulating thermal deformation measurement of structures in the simulated space on-orbit thermal environment.