The first cubesat launched using wood for its side panelling
One piece of cargo carried by the cargo Dragon to ISS earlier this week is the first cubesat ever to use wood for its side panelling.
Made by researchers in Japan, the tiny satellite weighing just 900g is heading for the International Space Station on a SpaceX mission. It will then be released into orbit above the Earth. Named LignoSat, after the Latin word for wood, its panels have been built from a type of magnolia tree, using a traditional technique without screws or glue.
Researchers at Kyoto University who developed it hope it may be possible in the future to replace some metals used in space exploration with wood. “Wood is more durable in space than on Earth because there’s no water or oxygen that would rot or inflame it,” Kyoto University forest science professor Koji Murata told Reuters news agency. “Early 1900s airplanes were made of wood,” Prof Murata said. “A wooden satellite should be feasible, too.”
The satellite’s frame is still metal, but by using wood for its side panelling the engineers hope to test the feasibility of wood as a in-space construction material.
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One piece of cargo carried by the cargo Dragon to ISS earlier this week is the first cubesat ever to use wood for its side panelling.
Made by researchers in Japan, the tiny satellite weighing just 900g is heading for the International Space Station on a SpaceX mission. It will then be released into orbit above the Earth. Named LignoSat, after the Latin word for wood, its panels have been built from a type of magnolia tree, using a traditional technique without screws or glue.
Researchers at Kyoto University who developed it hope it may be possible in the future to replace some metals used in space exploration with wood. “Wood is more durable in space than on Earth because there’s no water or oxygen that would rot or inflame it,” Kyoto University forest science professor Koji Murata told Reuters news agency. “Early 1900s airplanes were made of wood,” Prof Murata said. “A wooden satellite should be feasible, too.”
The satellite’s frame is still metal, but by using wood for its side panelling the engineers hope to test the feasibility of wood as a in-space construction material.
Readers!
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black. Your support allows me the freedom and ability to analyze objectively the ongoing renaissance in space, as well as the cultural changes -- for good or ill -- that are happening across America. Fourteen years ago I wrote that SLS and Orion were a bad ideas, a waste of money, would be years behind schedule, and better replaced by commercial private enterprise. Only now does it appear that Washington might finally recognize this reality.
In 2020 when the world panicked over COVID I wrote that the panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Only in the past year have some of our so-called experts in the health field have begun to recognize these facts.
Your help allows me to do this kind of intelligent analysis. I take no advertising or sponsors, so my reporting isn't influenced by donations by established space or drug companies. Instead, I rely entirely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, which gives me the freedom to write what I think, unencumbered by outside influences.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are four ways of doing so:
1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.
2. Patreon: Go to my website there and pick one of five monthly subscription amounts, or by making a one-time donation.
3. A Paypal Donation or subscription:
4. Donate by check, payable to Robert Zimmerman and mailed to
Behind The Black
c/o Robert Zimmerman
P.O.Box 1262
Cortaro, AZ 85652
You can also support me by buying one of my books, as noted in the boxes interspersed throughout the webpage or shown in the menu above.
While there is no water or oxygen in space to rot the wood, the sun‘s unfiltered rays will rapidly cause the wood to deteriorate, something that won‘t happen to metals.
David–
I’m just a psychology major but….
yeah, cursory search yields all manner of research concerning “radiation induced degradation of cellulose.”
There are certainly coatings you could apply, I remember reading an article a few years back regarding a push to use wood for medium-rise office buildings and what would be required for long-term stability in the rain, sun, etc. But I can’t find anything that states what, if any, treatments have been applied to the wood on this satellite. Since this satellite is designed to last for six months and is explicitly purposed to see how wood reacts in space, it may be that it’s untreated.
As a nerd of an engineer, I would like to point out the first wood satellite:
“The first attempts to perform a Moon landing took place in 1962 during the Rangers 3, 4 and 5 missions flown by the United States. All three Block II missions basic vehicles were 3.1 m high and consisted of a lunar capsule covered with a balsa wood impact-limiter, 650 mm in diameter, a mono-propellant mid-course motor, a retrorocket with a thrust of 5080 pound-force (22.6 kN),[11] and a gold- and chrome-plated hexagonal base 1.5 m in diameter. This lander (code-named Tonto) was designed to provide impact cushioning using an exterior blanket of crushable balsa wood and an interior filled with incompressible liquid freon. A 42 kg (56 pounds) 30-centimetre-diameter (0.98 ft) metal payload sphere floated and was free to rotate in a liquid freon reservoir contained in the landing sphere.”
“A capsule, carrying the seismometer and a telemetry system, will separate from the “bus” at a predetermined altitude (measured by a radar altimeter) and brake itself by means of a retrorocket to allow a hard survival landing at a speed of approximately 200 mph- a shock equivalent to a deceleration of about 3000 g’s.”
It appears Ranger 4’s capsule impacted along with the rest of the faulty vehicle (it had not been released to land alone since the spacecraft ran out of power due to failing to release its solar arrays early in the mission.. yeah blame power). The other two Rangers with the balsa sphere missed the Moon altogether.”
So, at least 2 Rangers with balsa “panelling” are somewhere in the great void.
With four to 6 possible sides to use I would think this is not just a test of the wood but it could have been a better test of the coatings to protect the wood.Each side could have has a bare wood section and three other section each with a different coating.
12 to 18 test sections.
The cube sat could have just hovered close to the station and been recovered in a year.
I think Uncle Sam had whole birch forests just for SLBM spikes or something…
I wonder about the vacuum drying it out to a desiccated state. Depending on various factors, it might disintegrate, or it might become a higher strength to weight material.
I remember hearing about a mine fire, where old wooden beams charred, but later metal reinforcements were found as puddles.
You want a sandwich
Wood was designed by nature to be recyclable and deteriorate rather quickly. The high temperatures and UV radiation of space will quickly turn the wood into charcoal (carbon) as the hydrogen and water in the cellulose (hydrocarbon) out gas.
Bristlecone Pine tree wood on Wheeler Peak in Nevada (that’s 2000 years old) is as hard as iron… But weighs nearly as much when other materials offer lighter/better protection.
I would point out that certain metals can’t be used as well, the heat that flows from the side facing the sun to the cold side also carries an electrical charge. (thermal pile affect)
In the early days of space, workable joints on solar panels and such would freeze up as the parts were welded together.
From the article:
“There’s nothing wrong with using wood in space – it’s using the right material for the right task.” — Dr Barber
Not necessarily true. At one company I worked for, another group once pumped down a vacuum chamber but could not get the vacuum to its required level. When they opened up to see what was wrong, they found some wood was left inside. It turns out wood outgasses. If Kyoto University did not use some form of coating on their wood, they will likely discover that the wood will desiccate, and I don’t know what else will outgas from it.
What is wrong with outgassing is that some of the vapor is going to condense on the optical surfaces, which are: camera lenses, detectors, solar cells, thermal control surfaces, and other surfaces that may be adversely affected by condensed materials.
This is a reason to keep this test satellite away from the ISS.
Max‘s point about electrical charges is already a concern for large thermal blankets, which often have a plastic outer layer. Large non-conducting surfaces are often equipped with occasional grounding in order to help prevent buid-up of electrical charges. This satellite is not large enough for this to be a serious problem, bit it may be advantageous for space-wood coatings to be electrically conductive.
“A 42 kg (56 pounds) 30-centimetre-diameter (0.98 ft) metal payload sphere…”
I believe 42kg is 92,4 pounds.
“Wood degradation under UV irradiation”
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1011134416300197
“Among environmental degradations of wood, photodegradation is the fastest and the strongest. Wood compounds, especially lignin, are able to absorb light at short wavelength (from 295 to 400 nm).
Lignin is a random and complex polymer which contains chromophoric structures (aromatic compounds) responsible for the wood colour.”