A Cubesat for South Africa

The Cape Peninsula University of Technology (CPUT) has recently launched the F'SATI post graduate programme in Satellite Engineering covering the broad field of satellite communication and power systems. The academic programme has been developed to provide students with a foundation to pursue research in this field.

F'SATI, the French-South African Institute of Technology, focuses on Electronic Engineering, Information and Communication Technology addressing three niche areas. Two of these are offered at the Tshwane University of Technology (TUT): Enabled Environment and Communication) while the third, Satellite Systems Engineering is offered at CPUT.

The academic programme is supplemented by practical experiments on a real satellite. Students will build a 3U CubeSat. The CubeSat concept originated from a partnership between the California Polytechnique University in San Luis Obispo and Stanford University in Paulo Alto. Between them, they developed a standardized space platform for academic satellite projects. It has since grown to become an international partnership of over 40 institutes that are developing Pico satellites containing scientific payloads. A standard CubeSat is a 10 cm cube with a mass of up to 1 kg.

Prof. Robert van Zyl, deputy director of F'SATI said at the launch of the new satellite clean room facilities at CPUT's Bellville campus that students will be building a 3U CubeSat which is three standard 10 x 10 cm cubes stacked on top of each other. The payloads will include a camera, a parrot repeater and a transponder. In partnership with the Hermanus Magnetic Observatory, a HF beacon will be included to assist the HMO to calibrate their radar systems in the Antarctic. A new type of magnetometer is also under consideration.

Prof. Van Zyl said that the CPUT was fortunate to have received a substantial financial contribution from the Department of Science and Technology through the National Research Foundation. He said from now on the clock starts ticking to complete the project in time to have a flight model on the table by October 2011 when the International Astronomy Conference is held in Cape Town.

Delegates attending the SARL Radio-Technology-in-Action symposium, to be held in Cape Town later this year, will have an opportunity to visit the clean room facilities.

The South African Radio League