The 5th element: Modular ground support equipment to new PERSEUS bi-liquid launcher
Creators: name:  F. CHAMPALOU 
Publisher: name: Proceedings of  the 9th European Conference for Aerospace Sciences. Lille, France, 27 June - 1 July, 2022
Year: 2022
Subjects: SPACE
ADVANCED TECHNOLOGIES
REUSABILITY

description: The CNES and the PERSEUS project are at the service of students in order to help them become game changers. The ambitious ground and flight demonstrator projects implemented in the program both contribute to the development of innovative technologies, and are in line with the CNES strategy for launchers. In the long term, the PERSEUS project has the objective to launch of a 5km apogee bi-fluid rocket with reuse on the basis of LOX/CH4 propulsion through the DREAM ON challenge. Several ground segment developments have been made repeatedly for previous PERSEUS launches such as SERA campaigns (solid propulsion) or CSPACE needs (student experimental rocket). For the next 2 years the PERSEUS project will essentially work on the System-of-interest, named ASTREOS System. It is a demonstrator of a recoverable first stage, including the associated Ground segment. The ground segment, or stage 0, is a large part of ASTREOS overall development and design. Due to the bi-liquid propulsion used for the first time in the framework of PERSEUS, fluid ground equipment has been designed with the help of our partner Ariane Group and the expertise of Vernon site. The previous PERSEUS launch campaigns used either a rail launch of Swedish Space Corporation available at ESRANGE or the PERSEUS rail launch. Nowadays, the PERSEUS rail launch is only used for CSPACE campaign and student experimental rockets. Neither SSC rail launch nor PERSEUS rail launch are compatible with new demonstrator ASTREOS because of fluid needs and demonstrator diameter. Aligned with PERSEUS roadmap, ground segment equipment is becoming more and more important in the overall development of PERSEUS project. The ground segment developed within the PERSEUS program is fully modular and adaptable. The roadmap from ASTREOS-1 to DREAM-ON is planning to have one launcher per year to launch at minimum and a possibility to use different launch bases such as SSC ESRANGE or CNES CSG. The ground segment has been designed as modular to have a low time to adapt to all new innovations of the ASTREOS versions keeping a quality of service of all necessary functions. The ground segment has been split into 5 main products: ? A mobile rail launch ? A transport and connection vehicle ? A ground station and bench control of the ground equipment ? A fluid ground support equipment ? A flight safety support All these products will interface with launch bases such as Guyana or Swedish Space Corporation, and allow the PERSEUS project to be autonomous on launch service. The mobile rail launch is a mobile product in the way that it can be installed and uninstalled where the demonstrator will be launched. The Kart - vehicle for transport and connection to the rail - follows the same logic: it is a mobile vehicle assembled at launch complex. The modularity, allowing the rail to leverage the next ASTREOS version, will be done by using a 3D printing for the support cradle. The entire PERSEUS ground segment, as it is the case for the rail and the kart, is to be installed directly during the pre-campaign phase and uninstalled after.