Outer Orbit: Updating the ISAM Facility

WEBVTT

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Dallas Campbell: Hello and
welcome to Outer Orbit, one of

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our little bonus episodes where
we continue the conversation

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from one of our main episodes.

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Today we're joined by Jeremy Hadall who's
the Robotics Development Lead at the

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Satellite Applications Catapult, and you
may remember, he was on last series, we

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actually visited what do we even call it?

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The robot yard.

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What,

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Jeremy Hadall: We, we call it the
ISAM Facility, so it's the in orbit

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Servicing and Assembly and Manufacturing
facility, and yeah, we call it the yard.

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It's not really a yard, it's just a big
black, dark long room as you remember.

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Dallas Campbell: It needs some
like kind of cool sci-fi name.

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Jeremy Hadall: Yeah.

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Well, we've named all the robots, so
we've got, well, we've got Mani and

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Sol are our main robots, and then
we have Kvasir which is the Norse

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God of imagination and invention and
we've got Baldur the guardian of the

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gates of hell, which, nice, nice.

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You know, this is what happens when
you employ, graduate engineers.

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Dallas Campbell: You can't see
this cause we're not filming it.

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But on the wall behind me, we've got
a picture of it and they do, it does

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look very sci-fi because your room is
black because it were meant to be in

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space, and just to remind our listeners

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what is it that your robots do?

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Jeremy Hadall: So, our robots
are black and they're there to

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mimic the in orbit environment.

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So what,

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Dallas Campbell: So the way
they move would be the way

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that a satellite might move.

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Jeremy Hadall: Exactly that.

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What we're trying to do is to
imitate the way a satellite would

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move in orbit by using the robots.

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We need to use the robots to do that
because obviously in orbit we don't have

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gravity, we don't have air resistance,
we don't have a lot of the things

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that we take for granted on earth.

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But the robots can adjust the
way they move to become that

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kind of environment for us.

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The robots are important, but
actually they're not the most

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important thing in that room.

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What's most important is the things
that are on the end of the robot.

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So the satellite models, the equipment
that we carry, they're the most

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important things for testing in that
room and then the robots are become

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important because we have to then take
off the shelf industrial robots and

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make them act as if they're satellites.

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Dallas Campbell: So just
to, just to be clear.

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So you would have a in your big long
black room, you've got a satellite which

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would behave as if it was in orbit and
then you have an approaching robot with

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a hand on it or whatever it is on it
that can do the fiddling about, and

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between them, they behave as they would.

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Jeremy Hadall: Yeah, that's
exactly, that's exactly what we do.

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Yeah, so it, so that could either be
from what we call rendezvous proximity

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operations, which basically means
coming up close to another satellite or

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actually doing something to the, what
we call the target satellite or the,

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the satellite we want to go and see.

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Dallas Campbell: And the
point of all this is?

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Jeremy Hadall: So the point of all
of this is firstly we need to get

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close to the satellite, so we need
to be able to identify it, navigate

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towards it in space, and we can
test all of that in the facility.

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We need to dock to the satellite.

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Which is not necessarily easy
because this isn't the ISS.

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They're not designed for docking.

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And then once we've docked, we want to
possibly refuel the satellite, service

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it, so change parts on the satellite.

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Maybe it's got a damaged solar panel.

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And also we might be able to
assemble much bigger structures.

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Dallas Campbell: When we had the
space shuttle for example, we could

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do things like go and fix the Hubble
Space Telescope because it's got a

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wonky mirror or whatever it might be.

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We can't really do this at the moment,
can't really go to satellites and

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tinker about fiddle, about refuel them.

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So this is a way of
servicing things in orbit.

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Jeremy Hadall: Absolutely.

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You're right, one of the Shuttles primary
roles was to build the ISS, take the

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bits up and assemble them, and also to
carry out the Hubble Service missions.

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Currently there is no easy or simple
way to do any of that now, because

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we don't have the Shuttle and nothing
is really designed to do that.

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So not only are we testing out the new
technologies that will allow us to do

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that, but we're also starting to look
at how do we design those satellites?

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What things do we need to change or things
do we need to add to make it happen?

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Dallas Campbell: Actually, and the
point is as well, that when we,

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when it was the Shuttle building
the trusses of the space station or

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Hubble, astronauts were involved.

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You'd tie an astronaut to a bit
of space arm and off they'd go.

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But this is all robotics.

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Jeremy Hadall: This is all robotics.

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So this is, this is moving away
from the Shuttle approach, which

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was, yes, you had a robot arm,
but it was generally manipulated

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from within the Shuttle itself.

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And astronauts actually
did the work themselves.

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We're trying to go to the stage
where we might have astronauts in the

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interim term controlling the robots.

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But ultimately we want to
do this fully autonomous.

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So one of the things we're looking
at is how do we build that autonomous

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ability, that capability into the robots?

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Dallas Campbell: Yeah.

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So you've had an overhaul.

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So tell us what's improved.

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What's changed?

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Jeremy Hadall: Yeah, so I think
when you were there, we were

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just starting the overhaul.

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I think we were just about to stop working
the yard and, and to reconfigure it.

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So we were very fortunate, UK
Space Agency gave us a 2 million

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pound stock grade of facility.

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Dallas Campbell: They're very generous.

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Jeremy Hadall: So we've done a number
of, a number of things in the facility.

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We've repainted it.

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That's not the biggest, biggest
thing, but we needed to repaint it.

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Dallas Campbell: They
gave you 2 million pounds.

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Jeremy Hadall: No, no, I shouldn't say

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Dallas Campbell: Presumably it's black.

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Jeremy Hadall: So we needed, we needed
to repaint it because after all the work

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we've done, so if you remember, we had a
lot of motion tracking systems in there.

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So we've upgraded all of those.

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So motion capture was good for us.

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It told us where the robots were, but
what it couldn't really do is it was make

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sure the robots went to the right places.

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So now we have that capability
so that allows us to give a lot

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of verifiable data to our users.

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We've got a new lighting system,
which is on a robot called Braggy.

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Kind of light you would
see at Glastonbury.

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It's a very big rotating pan tilt
spotlight and it's on a mobile robot.

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So we can move it to wherever we want to
in the facility and it mimics the motion

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of the sun around satellites in the orbit.

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So...

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Dallas Campbell: And
why is that important?

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Jeremy Hadall: Well, it's important
because, if you're in low Earth orbit,

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so let's say the same sort of orbit
as the International Space Station,

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you've got a 90 minute day, basically.

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The sun goes up and down in 90 minutes
and if you don't test your systems

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with that kind of lighting conditions
of going very bright to very dark.

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These kind of operations
happen very slowly.

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You would miss that crucial bit of
what happens when the sun comes up.

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Which sounds crazy, but it has a big
effect on some of the sensor systems.

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So we've got that system in there.

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We've got a big, virtual environment
now that we've built around the system

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so we can do a lot of simulation and
testing and then the biggest piece of

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equipment we've put in is something
we call the Gravity Offload System.

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That's really important for us.

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As I said earlier, on earth,
we can't replicate the in

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orbit environment perfectly.

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Because we have gravity and air.

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But in orbit we don't have any of that
stuff and that changes the way that

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satellites react if you touch them.

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So the best way I can explain this
is if you imagine you're standing

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on the, on the ground and you
throw a tennis ball in the air.

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Eventually air resistance will slow
that tennis ball down, and then gravity

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will take over and the tennis ball will
come back down to it to Earth, and maybe

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you'll catch it or maybe you'll drop it.

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If you are standing on the
ISS and do exactly the same

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and throw that tennis ball up.

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There's no air resistance, there's
no gravity, so that tennis ball

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will keep traveling away from you
until another force acts upon it.

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So if you come up to a satellite and
try and dock and you don't make a good

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positive connection straight away, you
are putting a force into that satellite.

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So that satellite is now moving away from
you at a speed, and it will keep going

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forever until something else happens.

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So what the Gravity Offload
System does is mimic that effect.

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We suspend a device from the system.

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It looks a little bit like a
crane, but it's a much more

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sophisticated version of a crane.

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So we suspend a satellite model from it.

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It holds itself in position.

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We have an internal measurement unit,
an IMU, that measures the forces being

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put through the device, and it's very,
very sensitive to the extent that

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we've had to move some of the air
conditioning around so that we don't

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get wind pushing it against it and if
it detects a force, then the offload

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system moves the satellite away from
the impact point as if it was in space.

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That sounds simple ish.

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Dallas Campbell: It's
probably quite complicated

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Jeremy Hadall: is

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it is very complicated to do on earth.

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We've been fortunate to work
with a company called Amentum.

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Amentum have put a lot of effort
into working with it, so we're really

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pleased to have worked with them.

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Dallas Campbell: So you've got
this great setup now, are you

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inviting people now to come in?

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It's like we're, we're open for business
if you, so how do people get in touch?

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Jeremy Hadall: Yeah.

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So we're definitely open for business.

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If people are interested in
understanding what the capabilities

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are then they can get in contact with
the Catapult through the website.

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Dallas Campbell: And is this an area
that Britain is poised and key to

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really use and develop and exploit.

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Jeremy Hadall: Yeah, I think
we're definitely poised

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to develop and exploit it.

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We're in Harwell today and just in the
Harwell campus, there must be a dozen

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companies who are developing these kind
of technologies who are ready to go.

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You can look, think to people
like GMV or Astro Scale who

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are here on the Harwell campus.

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They're developing these technologies.

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They've used the system.

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They're planning to use
the system in the future.

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So we are, we are right at the
leading edge of this kind of

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technology and where we can take it.

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Dallas Campbell: That's great.

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Well listen, thank you very much.

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Good luck with it.

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I'm going to come back next year and
even more amazing things I'm sure.

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Jeremy Hadall: Absolutely.

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Yeah.

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Dallas Campbell: But I wish
you all the best for this year.

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Jeremy Hadall: Thank you very much.

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Thank you.

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Dallas Campbell: To hear future episodes
of In Orbit, be sure to subscribe on

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your favorite podcast app and head
over to YouTube to watch the video

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versions of all of our discussions.

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And if you'd like to find out more
about how Space is empowering your

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industry, visit the Catapult website
or join them on social media.