Magnetic bearing reaction wheels for low-jitter and long-life operation

Space has become a critical domain in achieving US military aims. However, rapid advances in adversarial capabilities, including space-based nuclear weapons and hypersonic missiles with faint signatures, are putting American and allied space assets at risk. To counter these advances, the DAF must optimize satellite sensing and missile tracking performance, leverage optical communication for extremely low-latency communication and enable space-based directed energy to improve our offensive capabilities. To do this, satellite bus architecture must improve to meet the increasingly rigorous pointing requirements of advanced payloads, on the order of micro-radians or less.  Magma Space is developing ultra-stable magnetic-bearing reaction wheels that improve pointing performance across precision satellite applications such as optical communications, remote imaging, navigation and directed energy. Magma’s magnetic-bearing reaction wheel eliminates the primary source of disruptive micro-vibration (aka ‘jitter’), which originates from reaction wheel ball-bearing friction and imperfections and degrades performance and reliability (notable failures occurred on Kepler, Dawn and Hubble). In contrast, magnetic bearings levitate the flywheel to eliminate contact points, leading to improved efficiencies at high speed and incredibly low micro-vibration output. Other advantages include operation in a wide temperature range, the absence of wear or lubricant, and increased reliability. Through October ’22 and August ’23 test campaigns at NASA Goddard, Magma successfully reduced jitter output 95% compared to a space-qualified ball-bearing reaction wheel with similar performance characteristics. This STTR Phase II effort, in partnership with MIT Lincoln Laboratory, Stellar Solutions and Moog, will ultimately develop a scalable simulation suite and physical magnetic reaction wheel that has passed environmental testing. By the end of this effort, functional, temperature, vacuum and other tests will be carried out on the prototype to be ready for in-orbit demonstration.