Development and Implementation of Efficiency-Improving Analysis Methods for the SAGE III on ISS Thermal Model Originating

ABSTRACT The Stratospheric Aerosol and Gas Experiment III (SAGE III) instrument is the fifth in a series of instruments developed for monitoring aerosols and gaseous constituents in the stratosphere and troposphere. SAGE III will be delivered to the International Space Station (ISS) via the SpaceX Dragon vehicle in 2015. A detailed thermal model of the SAGE III payload has been developed in CRTech Thermal Desktop® (TD). Several novel methods have been implemented to facilitate efficient payload-level thermal analysis, including the use of TD assemblies to move payloads from the Dragon trunk to the Enhanced Operational Transfer Platform (EOTP) to its final home on the Expedite the Processing of Experiments to Space Station (ExPRESS) Logistics Carrier (ELC)-4, implementation of a design of experiments (DoE) methodology to determine the worst-case orbits for SAGE III while on ISS, incorporation of older models in varying unit sets, ability to change units easily (including hard-coded logic blocks), case-based logic to facilitate activating heaters and active elements for varying scenarios within a single model, incorporation of several coordinate frames to easily map to structural models with differing geometries and locations, and streamlined results processing using an Excel-based text file plotter developed in-house at LaRC. This document presents an overview of the SAGE III thermal model and describes the development and implementation of these efficiency-improving analysis methods.