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The thermal design of the Mars lander Beagle 2 must ensure the probe survives all mission phases - in particular the lander must survive the extremes of the Martian weather during the Operational phase. To minimise political risks and to simplify the Cruise and Coast phase thermal designs, a baseline architecture for the lander which does not use radioisotope heater units (RHUs) has been conceived. This design relies on the absorption of solar energy during the day using a coated solar absorber unit (SAU) and the storage of this energy as sensible heat in order to maintain the temperature of the battery and critical electronics during the night with minimum energy demand. Extensive modelling of the lander for a range of environmental conditions has been performed to optimise the thermal design with respect to performance, mass and heater power.

A number of tests have been performed on two coatings having relatively low αs/ε ratios in order to qualify them for use on the Coronal Diagnostic Spectrometer (CDS). The coatings tested were (i) a 4 μm layer of SiOx on a hand polished aluminium alloy substrate, and (ii) a white Plasmocer [1] coating on an aluminium alloy substrate. The tests performed included the measurement of thermo-optical properties, an evaluation of minimum adhesive strength, the effects of thermal cycling in vacuum and proton bombardment, and resistance to cleaning processes.

The Coronal Diagnostic Spectrometer is an instrument designed to take measurements of the solar corona and is therefore pointed directly at the sun. The structure must be maintained within tight temperature limits to prevent the loss of image quality due to thermal distortions. A charged couple device (CCD) detector must be cooled below -80°C to give adequate performance and spacecraft interface considerations have also imposed severe requirements on the thermal control subsystem. One particular aspect of the instrument design is the need for careful contamination control and this has been considered a high priority in material selection. All these features have made the design of the thermal control subsystem an interesting and challenging problem which is described in this paper together with some of the analysis results which supported the design.