Worlds First Wooden Satellite to be Launched by Year End

Jun, 2021 - By SMI

Mr. Jari Makinen came up with the idea of world’s first wooden satellite, working on it with the team, and it is expected that the satellite could be launched by the end of this year.

It’s the first time in the world’s history that a satellite is being constructed with the local hardware material that could obtained easily and this would be launched and entered in the orbit soon. This satellite is constructed largely with plywood, making a box, and sensors are placed inside it from European Space Agency (ESA) to learn the material power in space.

Mr. Jari Makinen, Finnish Science journalist, came up with this new idea of wooden satellite to be launched up to the stratosphere. He started the project with commercial backing and then partnered with Rocket Lab, which was the suppliers of the electron booster for lifting off. Meanwhile the ESA was functioning on sensor suite and onboard camera, which would capture the pictures and track the performance of the satellite in space.

This miniature satellite is cube-shaped, made up of wooden plywood, measuring around 10cm along each side. The unique feature of the satellite is that it’s wooden and the only non-wooden part of the satellite is the aluminum railing, which is important for positioning in space. It wasn’t the ordinary plywood, because it’s too humid for its usage in space. It was placed in the thermal vacuum chamber to extract humidity and dry it out. The atomic layer deposition was also performed by thin aluminum oxide layers putting together, which was essential for contracting electrons. This will result in minimal outgassing or extraction of vapors from wood in space and also protect the satellite from the erosive effects of atomic oxygen.

The mission planners are planning at the best with certain expectations of satellite model protection and its darkening, atomic oxygen breakdown by UV rays and the satellite launch to enter the planet orbits.