12U CubeSat
Blue Canyon Technologies
The Blue Canyon Technologies 12U CubeSat is a reliable, high-performing, and flight-proven satellite bus from the XB line, offering a turnkey solution for various space missions.
Technical specifications
- Class
- 12U
- Available payload volume
- 8U (typical)
- Pointing accuracy
- ±0.002° (1-sigma), 3 axes, 2 Trackers
- Orbit altitude / orbit lifetime
- LEO (> 5 years), GEO (> 2 years), Deep Space (> 2 years)
- Real-world missions
- Proven Heritage
- Units launched
- 03
- Energy storage
- 6.8 – 20.4 Ah
- Solar array power
- 92 W - 108 W
- Pointing stability
- 1 arc-sec over 1 sec
- Agility
- > 5 deg/sec
- Orbit knowledge
- 10m, 0.15 m/s (1-sigma)
- Data interfaces
- UART (3.3 V, 2.5 V LVDS, RS-422, RS-485), SpaceWire, 3.3 V In/Out
- LEO uplink
- Nominal 100 Kbps
- LEO downlink
- S-Band 2 Mbps standard
- LEO downlink (2)
- X-Band up to 10 Mbps
About
The Blue Canyon Technologies 12U CubeSat is part of the XB line of CubeSats, which boasts over 50 launched units. It is designed to be a reliable, high-performing, and flight-proven platform, providing a highly accurate, turnkey solution for various space missions. The platform offers a typical available payload volume of 8U. It features a pointing accuracy of ±0.002° (1-sigma) across 3 axes with 2 trackers. The 12U CubeSat is designed for long-duration missions, with an orbit lifetime of over 5 years in Low Earth Orbit (LEO), over 2 years in Geostationary Earth Orbit (GEO), and over 2 years in Deep Space. The product has a proven heritage with real-world missions. One notable mission is ASCENT for the Air Force Research Laboratory, where a Blue Canyon XB12 CubeSat bus successfully demonstrated a small satellite in Geostationary orbit, including cold-gas thrusters, electric propulsion, and a commercial-off-the-shelf global positioning system receiver. Another mission, SLINGSHOT for The Aerospace Corporation, utilized an XB12 CubeSat bus to carry 19 payloads to low-Earth orbit, demonstrating the accessibility of integrating numerous payloads into a single interface. Blue Canyon Technologies also provided mission operations for the SLINGSHOT mission.
Documentation
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