2011 International Conference on Electronic & Mechanical Engineering and Information Technology
Heat Flux Analysis of Space Camera with Thermal Door
D o u Qiang Li Jindong
Research and Development Centre Institute of Spacecraft System
DFH Satellite CO.Ltd. Engineering
Beijing 100094, China China Academy of Spacecraft
douqiang@tsinghua.org.cn Beijing 100094, China
lij indong@hq. cast
Abstract- Thermal stability is an important parameter which can
affect the optical ability of large aperture space camera. Most of
space cameras with large aperture and high resolution need high
thermal stability, which means the temperature gradient should be
no more than 2°C. This situation causes that the thermal control
system should increase the design criteria to meet the challenge.
Space heat flux including vertical incident solar rays, infrared
radiation from earth and solar rays reflected by earth are the major
factors which affect the temperature flied of the camera. The space
heat flux of some agility remote sensing satellite changes within a
wide-range. In this paper comparison of using thermal door or not
in such camera is introduced. The heat flux of the space camera is
analyzed and the effect of thermal control system is described.
Keywords- space camera; thermal door; space heat flux;
radiation angle factor
I. INTRODUCTION
High resolution pictures from remote sensing satellite
can be widely used in resources, country mapping,
meteorology, agriculture and military affairs. These fields
are basic to the country development. The thermal stability
of the space camera is one of the most important factors to
insure the high resolution. There are inner factors which
meanly include instrument heat and outside factors which
composed of solar rays, infrared radiation from earth and
solar reflected by earth affecting the temperature flied of the
camera. In order to keep the temperature steady, thermal
control system including active control and passive control
is used in the camera. Different kinds of materials, which
have different absorptance, are often used in passive control.
Active control includes direct current heating, phase change
material, capillary pumped loop (CPL), etc. Direct current
heating which would cost lots of energy in the satellites is
one of ordinary active thermal control methods in domestic
satellite production. Thermal door, which has been proven
to be useful to release the effect of heat flux, is usually used
in large aperture space camera in foreign country. It can
keep the stability of the space camera, and reduce the
compensating heating power. Thermal door is often
installed by one side of the camera. It is opened when the
space camera is working, and it is closed in order to reduce
the thermal leakage when the measurement is finished.
This paper has summarized the application of several
thermal doors used in the large aperture space cameras in
978-l-61284-088-8/ll/$26.00 ©2011 IEEE 804
Pan Zengfu
Research and Development Centre
DFH Satellite CO.Ltd.
Beijing 100094, China
Pangzengfu@dfh.cast
foreign country, and builds the model of a typical space
optical system. Two different operate modes, with and
without thermal door, are simulated in this paper. The effects
of maintaining space camera thermal stability in using
thermal door are analyzed.
II. APPLICATION OF THERMAL DOOR USED IN CHINESE
AND FOREIGN SPACE CAMERA
Thermal door of space camera was first used in
foreign countries in the end of 1980s, several remote
sensing satellites used thermal door, and most of them have
been proven to be successful. The Hubble Space Telescope
is one of the earliest spacecraft which used thermal door.
The thermal door of Hubble Space Telescope used a single
plate which was driven by electric engine. The door was
made of aluminous honeycomb board, and the diameter of
the door was 3 meters. The specific functions of thermal
door include reducing thermal control energy, irradiation
protection, impact protection, and laser protection.
In recent years, the high resolution remote sensing
satellites lunched abroad, such as Ikonos > QuickBird>
Geoeye> Worldview-2, all adopted single plate driven by
electric engine. The on-off angel of the thermal door was
between 180° and 270° . Outside the thermal door there
was multichamber thermal insulation material covering on
the plate. The surface outside was daubed by high
reflectivity material in order to reflect the solar radiation,
and the surface inside the camera was painted black for the
purpose of erasing parasitic light. Some of the thermal doors
put electric heater on the inside surface to keep the
temperature steady [1] .
Thermal door was firstly used in Chinese satellite in 2004.
The optical system of that satellite was situated in a close
cabin which was filled up with gas. That camera observed
the earth through a scuttle and outside the scuttle there was a
single plate thermal door driven by electric engine. The
thermal door has been validated very useful by the orbit
database. It was one of the most available manners to
preserve the temperature of the optical system.
III. SPACE CAMERA HEAT FLUX MODEL
The satellite operating mode in one cycle is shown in
Figure 1 . The solar array of that satellite is on the opposite
side of the camera. According to the mission, the satellite
12-14 August, 2011
images from north latitude 60 ° to south latitude 60 ° , the COS^COSfl^^
longest imaging time is 15 minutes. The satellite transfers
X dA,Ae
-JL 7lll
(2)
the database when it is in the shadow of the earth and the Solar rays reflected by earth take a small part of the
solar array face to the sun when the satellite flight over the total space heat flux, so the radiation angle coefficient of
South and North Pole. The space camera of this kind of solar rays reflected XdAjAes is often calculated as following
satellite faces to the deep cold background, and it causes
that the heat leaks out quickly without thermal door.
In the equation below, O is phase angle which means
the angle between the line from satellite to earth and solar
ray. The heat flux of solar rays reflected by earth is shown
as following
cos a • cos a,
dqes = pS • dA • cos O • IT (4)

Figure 1 Satellite flight mode

The periodic time of the satellite is 98 minutes
including 26 minutes in the shadow (CD), 32 minutes
imaging or face to the earth (AB), 24 minutes over North
Pole (DA) and 16 minutes over South Pole (BC). The Figure 2 Radiation angle coefficient calculation method
camera opens the thermal door when it images in AB period The optical system thermal model without thermal
and closes in all the other time. This paper compares the two door is shown as Fig.3.
situations, the space camera with and without thermal door,
then calculates the electric heating energy of these two
situations and analyses the function of the thermal door.
After preliminary analysis, this paper makes some
presumptions.
1. The thermal door opening and closing is
instantaneous, so is the satellite changing attitude.
2. The inside temperature of the space camera should
be kept at 18 ± 2 °C according to the satellite design Figure 3. Optical system heat exchange model without thermal door
handbook. Electric heater is often used to control the The following equations are built according to the
temperature. In this paper, the temperature of space camera model shown in Fig.3.
is 18 °C, and the temperature of the thermal door is 20 °C
.+1
when it is closed.
dqout=£a(T4-T04)-dA
3. The solar radiation heat flux S is 1353 W [3]. The
situation that the camera faces to the sun when it is changing l
~P o^AC -
dq =a^—^-SdA\\
cosa T cosa
i( ) 2(T)■dA„ (5)
attitude does not exist.
cos a^z) • cos a2(z)
4. This kind of remote sensing is usually in low earth dqes = apS • dA • cos O(r) • IT -dAv
orbit, then the temperature of the earth is supposed to be 4°C,
The optical system thermal model with thermal door
and the reflection index P is fixed to be 0.30[4]. is shown in Fig.4.
The heat flux of the camera lens includes infrared
radiation from earth and solar reflected by earth in this
paper. Vertical incident solar rays is not considered [5]. The
infrared radiation heat flux dqe from earth to a certain
infinitesimal dA of the camera is shown as following
dqe =lz£.sdA\l JJA —l2 ^E (1)
4 * nl
The r a d i a t i o n angle c o e f f i c i e n t XdAAe of dA to
the visible area of the earth AE is shown as following Figure 4 Optical system heat exchange model with thermal door
equation and Fig. 2.

805
 The following equations are built according to the
model shown in Fig.4.
dqout=£o(Tj -T04)-dA
qeiec=\\/(Tin-Tout)dA
■ I - / "sdA cos ax(r) cos a2(z)
dq e
4 iiA
n\l nV
dAE
cos ax(r) • cos a2(r)
dqes=apS-dA-cos®(T)-\\ -dAF
nlz
IV. RESULTS OF THE MODEL CALCULATION
The radiation angle coefficient from camera lens to
the earth in the equations can be calculated according to the
attitude of the satellite. The absorptivity and emissivity of
the materials refers to reference [4]. The starting time of this
paper is the time when the satellite has finished imaging and
is going to enter the charging mode. The radiation angle
coefficient is calculated each 10° , and the heat leakage and
the electric heat power are calculated by the equations (5)
and (6).
According to the attitude of the satellite, supposing
that the solar rays shoot the earth equator at right angles [6][7],
the earth infrared and reflect radiation angle coefficient are
shown in the following figure.
Figure 5. Earth infrared and reflect radiation angle coefficient
The heat flux arrived at the space camera lens is
shown in the following figure. The orbit inclination angle is
98 ° , and the average earth reflection coefficient P is
supposed to be 0.3.
Figure 6. Earth infrared and reflect heat flux in orbit maneuver mode
The whole flight time compensation electric heat
power is calculated. The two different conditions, with
thermal door and without thermal door on the camera, are
shown in the Fig. 7.
(6)
Figure 7 Compensation electric heat power of two different conditions
According to Fig. 7, the camera with thermal door needs
less compensation electric heat power than that without
thermal door. Both of the two methods can meet the
challenges that the temperature of camera should be kept
around 18°C. The average compensation electric heat power
without thermal door is 90.7 W. The average compensation
electric heat power with thermal door is only 33.4 W.
V. CONCLUSION
The orbit maneuver ability is one of the most
advanced ability of the remote sensing satellite development.
This feature determines that the heat flux of satellite
changes fast and the camera lens leaks a lot of heat. The
space heat flux is the most important factor which affects
the temperature stability. This paper analyses two different
conditions in one model, compares the camera with thermal
door and without thermal door and the conclusion is
summarized as following.
1. The heat flux achieves maximum quantity when the
satellite camera works. The camera lens faces to the deep
cool space when it flight across the south and north poles,
which causes that the heat flux achieves minimum quantity
and heat leaks rapidly.
2. After installing the thermal door, 6 3 % of the
compensation electric heat power is decreased. The thermal
door can save the energy in the satellite, and keep the
temperature stable at the same time.
The thermal door is the most effective method to saving
the energy, but considering that the thermal door is an
activity component, it needs fast response, long lifespan and
well reliability to satisfy the satellite design safety factor.
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