Helmholtz-Cage: Electronics Box Assembly

The first component of our magnetic test stand (or #HelmholtzCage) to be assembled is the electronics box. The only purpose of this is to switch the polarity of the current running through the coils when needed. For this an Arduino connected to the control computer switches one relay for each axis.To build it we had to first cut out holes for the connectors in the front and back panels. Then all electrical components had to be soldered to the printed circuit board and lastly cables were routed from the PCB to the connectors leading outside. This video shows some of the final steps of this process.

For the CubeSats #EIVE of Uni Stuttgart IRS and our own #SOURCE we are building a magnetic field test stand, also called a Helmholtz Cage. Its purpose is to place a satellite or magnetic sensor in the middle and then generate an arbitrary magnetic field around it. This way we can recreate the magnetic environment in orbit and test that the spacecraft measures them correctly and computes the correct attitude control commands. We can even simulate spinning by rotating the field. This video series shows the process of building it.

The construction of this test stand is done as a bachelors thesis as part of the EIVE project of the Institute for Space Systems (IRS) at the University of Stuttgart. The sizing and design was done by another student in a previous thesis.

Music by Everyday Astronaut.

[devindranmac]

Hi. I’m a final year student doing my final year project on design, fabrication and testing of a Helmholtz cage for ADC of small CubeSats. May I know the process of testing phase details? That would be really helpful for my final year project.