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Ball Aerospace & Technologies has started to power the Joint Polar Satellite System spacecraft bus, kicking off a nine-month integration and testing phase as the company prepares to deliver the spacecraft to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
The company said Monday the continuous power on-off cycle involves operating the satellite system with the electrical power and distribution and command and data handling subsystems.
“Following installation and testing of satellite components and subsystems this year we’ll be ready for instrument integration at the satellite level beginning in November 2014,” said Cary Ludtke, vice president and general manager for Ball Aerospace’s operational space unit.
NOAA has set a 2017 target launch date and the weather observation satellite has already completed testing for interoperability with the SpaceWire communication network.
Further work will occur at the Ball Aerospace Fisher Integration Facility in Boulder, Colo.
The Ozone Mapping and Profiler Suite and the other four JPSS-1 instruments are all in the environmental testing phase.
