Design of a smart bidirectional actuator for space operation

A common need for space borne instruments, satellites and planetary exploration payloads is the usage of compact, light and low power actuators. In the recent years, this need has been partially solved by the development of customized solutions with an increasing usage of smart materials. A linear bidirectional actuator based on shape memory alloy technology is presented in this work. The device has been conceived to lock the double-pendulum scanning mechanism of a miniaturized Fourier transform spectrometer for planetary observation. The mechanism class is that of pin pullers, with the pin locking the movable components of the spectrometer during launch and landing phases. The proposed mechanism, differently from available off-the-shelf devices, allows multiple actuations without the need of manual resetting. Moreover, the device requires to be powered only to change its status. An appealing feature of the adopted concept is that the actuation is intrinsically shock-less, a key requirement for deployment of devices sensitive to mechanical vibration and shocks. All these characteristics, in addition to the design flexibility of the proposed concept in terms of achievable forces and strokes, make the designed actuator promising for many different applications, from space to ground. The designed bidirectional actuator provides 0.6 mm stroke and a 50 N preload but it represents just an example of implementation for the proposed concept. Structural design of the functional elastic components and SMA alloy characterization have guided the actuator development. A mockup of the actuator has been manufactured and the predicted performances preliminary validated.