Abstract
To develop elements of a system for contact-free transportation of objects in space has now become an urgent task for the contemporary space-related activities. The purpose of work that is presented hereinafter was to conduct ground tests of the ion source, which is a key element of the above-mentioned system, and to compare the obtained experimental data with the mathematical simulation results in order to build a refined physical and mathematical model of the ion source. Such model was built on the basis of the classical problem regarding the motion of charged particles in an electrostatic field. Parameters of the ion source have been determined experimentally for several operating modes using various structural designs of the ion source electrodes. Two types of ion optics were tested—with slit and round apertures. Good correlation between simulation results and experimental data has been demonstrated. The optimum ion source operation modes have been identified to ensure minimum divergence angles for the plasma beam exiting from the ion source, which in its turn maximizes the pulse transmitted to the transported object.
Highlights
The service spacecraft (SSC) can be used to insert a new spacecraft (SC) into operating orbit or to perform its orbit raising in the event of the main propulsion system failure in order to extend the lifetime of operating SC by raising its orbit or transferring the SC into other operating orbits, as well as to remove dead or failed SC into graveyard orbits
The analysis has shown that the plasma potential difference between the gas discharge chamber (GDC) and accelerating electrode (AE) always exceeds the potential difference between the screen electrode (SE) and AE by 20–30 V
1.33 geometrical parameters presented in Table 1 have been a propellant
Summary
Publisher’s Note: MDPI stays neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. A similar principle for space debris (SD) removal was subsequently proposed by Japanese [16] and European [17,18] experts Such SD removal method was named the Ion Beam Shepherd. 50–60 years the lated as follows: if in the coming decades there is no transition to new rocket and space near-Earth space environment contamination with SD will significantly complicate furhardware technology in order to prevent the SD number growth, in. An increase in the number of SO in near-Earth orbits as a function of time is shown by the plot below (Figure 1 [21]). The risk of a catastrophic collision between the Space Shuttle type spaceship and SD was roughly rated as 1 to 300. The International Space Station performs a collision avoidance maneuver when the probability of collision is 1 to 10,000 [24]
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