Miniature orbital dexterous servicing system

Current concepts for robotic satellite servicing use robotic systems similar in size to candidate client spacecraft, requiring similar launch vehicles and roughly equal costs. To achieve economic viability, proposed systems require multiple clients on each mission, restricting applications to geostationary orbit to ensure an adequate number of potential clients and limiting each system to one repetitive common task such as refueling. This paper investigates the potential to create a new class of dexterous servicing vehicles based on small satellite technologies, including recent developments in highly capable lightweight dexterous manipulators. A notional design for a Miniature Orbital Dexterous Servicing System (MODSS) vehicle was developed and applied to a candidate servicing opportunity from recent flight history. While much work remains to be done, all indications are that a MODSS system offers a realistic potential for economically viable missions to a single client, allowing individualized logistics supply and launch-on-need to any required orbit.

1