An Adaptable Spacecraft Telemetry System

Abstract

Because of the limitations of hardwired telemetry systems, existing spacecraft are denied the capability of revising their sampling structure, their sampling rates, or the experiments and/or test points to be sampled. A centralized system to provide these capabilities is described in this paper. This system is called the Flexible Automatic Computer Telemetry System (FACTS). As initially conceived, the FACTS, through the use of a stored program, will be able to sample a large number of channels with great flexibility in sampling rates, sampling structure and the selection of experiments and/or test points. This paper outlines the basic spacecraft and ground station system and illustrates the flexibility which can be achieved with it. Selected diagrams are given along with a description of the operation of the various units in the system.