Mechanics

The picture above shows all parts of our experiment assembled. You can see the hatch, the boardbox and the inner chamber, which are the most important components in our module.

 

Our board box is designed to keep the electrical boards inside protected from water and dirt. It is mostly made of aluminum plates to save weight, while possessing a basic stability. Spacers are used to avoid any contact between the boards. The access to the outside will be possible through plugs and sealed holes in the plates. While our box is not designed to be gastight, we use a silica box to get air inside or out of the box to keep the humidity outside.

 

The main task of the hatch is to mount the sensors in the module and give them access to the ambient air by demand. The sensors will be protected from exhaust gases at the launch. That will be realized by a hatch plate that is closed and fixed by a cylinder solenoid in the initial position. By moving the solenoid and unfix the plate temporarily we open the hatch with springs that push the aluminum plate up. When it is open we use the solenoid again to fix this position. In the pictures below you see a schematic of this mechanism.