Italian composite company Bercella has installed a carbon fiber reinforced plastic dispenser structure aboard the European Space Agency’s Vega rocket, which has been successfully launched.
The company also made one of the structural parts for the 50 microsatellites on the space vehicle.
According to Bercella, the Small Spacecraft Mission Service (SSMS) dispenser consists of a modular architecture, aimed at hosting multiple combinations of small satellites at once; a hexagonal lower section, with two deployers for nanosatellites on each side, for a total amount of 12 deployers and 46 Cubesats in total; and an upper section capable of hosting various configurations of micro, nano and mini satellites. It is made from several large sandwich panels produced with high modulus carbon fiber prepreg.
‘We are extremely proud for our contribution to this milestone for European space industry,’ said CEO Massimo Bercella. ‘We are ready to strengthen Italy’s participation to space market evolution, contributing as a key European player for composites structures for space. We praise ESA's willingness to support European SMEs in this important step forward.’
This story uses material from Bercella, with editorial changes made by Materials Today. The views expressed in this article do not necessarily represent those of Elsevier.
