Deploying Analyses of Large Deployable Space Antenna under Gravity Environment

Abstract

The gravity is a serious problem for the deploying experiments of a large deployable space antenna on the ground. With the increasing trend for much bigger size deployable structures, new ground experiment methods with expected effects or with low cost should be explored. On this special object, we propose several deploying schemes from theoretical design, to practical design and then to actual design on a new folded hoop-rib mesh antenna structure we proposed before. Through the fundamental processes from theoretical analyses to actual experiments, it shows that the fairly complex mechanism can be deployed successfully, which reveals that the new deploying antenna structure design is feasible and reasonable.