News

The SES-17 satellite was successfully launched into space onboard an Ariane 5 launcher operated by Arianespace from the Europe’s Spaceport in Kourou on October 23^rd 2021.

Built by Thales Alenia Space, SES-17 marks an important milestone in satellite technology as the first Ka-band geostationary satellite to embark a fully digital payload powered the most powerful digital transparent processor (DTP) ever placed in orbit.

This satellite is equipped with the first ever Mechanically pumped Loop (MPL) to be mounted on a telecommunication satellite!

The MPL is made of a network of pipes and a mechanical pump, which circulates a refrigerant fluid to collect heat wherever it is created and transport it to the radiators. This makes it possible to maximise use of the available surface inside the satellite, to accommodate the repeaters required for large Very High Throughput Satellite missions.

EHP is proud to have contributed to the development and to have supplied this new generation of heat exchangers.

Sources:

https://www.thalesgroup.com/fr/monde/espace/news/le-satellite-ses-17-arrive-guyane-francaise

https://www.ses.com/press-release/ses-17-successfully-launched-ariane-5

http://www.esa.int/Our_Activities/Telecommunications_Integrated_Applications/Very_High_Throughput_Satellite_ready_to_pump_heat

2021 will remain a particular year for EHP…

Besides celebrating the 20 years of EHP, this year also marks the beginning of the ‘new EHP’ !

Over the years, EHP has grown from a small 600m² facility to working areas spread over 4 buildings for a total of 4500m².

Enough ? Not at all ! With the major OneSat project arriving, and with our heat pipe production continuing to double every year, EHP needs much more space.

In 2019, the idea of a new modern building was put on the table. Two years later, in May 2021, the work of a brand new 10 000m² facility has begun !

By the beginning of 2023, EHP will have close to 8000m² of industrial areas, including a 2000m² clean room for the assembly of our thermal and deployable systems. Our teams will also be reassembled together in a nice 2000m² office building that will offer a well-being working environment to all of us.

The first part of the project, the industrial hall and half of the clean room, should be delivered in the beginning of 2022. The offices and the rest of the clean room should be available 6 months later, and the final industrial areas for machining and logistics will close the project in the beginning of 2023.

With these new facilities, EHP is now ready for the next 20 years !

Most aircraft de-icing systems have to generate power for the heaters. A new alternative efficiently draws heat from the engines.

The formation of ice on aircraft is both commonplace and dangerous. An ice layer on wings and control surfaces can change their shape, potentially affecting the pilot’s control of the aircraft. Ice also adds weight.

Under certain conditions, usually at fairly low altitudes, so-called icing-clouds can contain droplets of water that remain liquid despite their temperature being below freezing. Upon contact with any solid surface, the droplets instantaneously freeze onto the surface. A thick ice layer can form in just seconds. This can be extremely dangerous for small aircraft, which must avoid such clouds completely. Larger aircraft carry de-icing systems.

The main types heat the wing and the engine air intake, via either electric elements or a hot-air system. Although such systems work reliably, they are very energy-hungry, consuming up to 40 % of the total power the aircraft produces. Any reduction in energy consumption would mean significant financial savings for the aircraft operator.

Putting waste heat to use

The EU-funded PIPS project developed a new kind of heating system. Instead of generating heat at great cost, the system transfers waste heat from the engines to the engine air intake. Thus it is highly efficient. The system is initially intended for the air-intake part of medium-sized turboprop aircraft.

However, it could eventually be adapted to any aircraft having hot engines near the wings, meaning virtually any aircraft. The patent-pending system is called Capillary Pumped Loop. “This is a closed circuit in which circulates a fluid – methanol – which is always at saturation,” explains project coordinator, Romain Rioboo. “That means it’s always around the point of phase change between liquid and vapour.”

The engine supplies heat to the evaporator, which evaporates the liquid. Gaseous methanol circulates to the condenser, where it returns to liquid, releasing heat. The liquid circles back to the evaporator via a capillary wick, which is a passive pump. The physics of the phase change between liquid and gas means that the liquid can absorb and transport a large amount of heat.

So the system is very efficient, using engine heat that would otherwise be wasted. This saves having to generate large amounts of heat as in conventional de-icing systems.

Good progress so far

The project has achieved technology readiness level 5. The concept has been demonstrated, but the technology still needs some refinement. Researchers initially planned to use off-the-shelf components. However, problems encountered along the way required design of a completely new system.

This was successful but caused delays. “We have yet to change the condenser design to improve heat distribution on the surface of the engine intake,” adds Rioboo, “and test the change before envisaging flight tests.” However, in laboratory and icing wind tunnel testing, the project achieved effective heat transfer in a full-size model engine setup and transported up to 10 kilowatts of heat under icing conditions.

This exceeds the requirements for a de-icing system. Further development is uncertain. If that takes place, the outcome will be a cheap and efficient aircraft de-icing solution.

Keywords

PIPS, aircraft, de-icing, system, heat-exchange, Capillary Pumped Loop, methanol

Source : https://cordis.europa.eu/article/id/430114-novel-system-de-ices-aircraft-using-engine-heat?WT.mc_id=exp

EHP is celebrating its 20th Anniversary !

Based on SABCA’s Two-phase departement and the impulse of Pr. Jean-Claude Legros of the Université Libre de Bruxelles, EHP’s was born on the 30th of March 2001 with the vision to conquer the enormous potential of Two-Phase technology in space applications.

With the addition of more than 20 years of SABCA’s knowledge and heritage, EHP boasts at least 40 years of experience and expertise.

Today, as a subsidiairy of Airbus Defence & Space and the support of the SRIW and SOGEPA, EHP is the European leader for the delivery of cooling solutions for space applications.

With its EN9100 certification and decidated in house facilities, we have expanded the product porfolio to 3 major product branches :

• Heat pipes (CCHP & VCHP)
• Thermal Systems (using loop heat pipes)
• Deployable Systems

In its 20 years of history, EHP has grown to become in 2021 a company employing close to 100 highly skilled people.

In the next year, we hope to share with you a piece of this history with a monthly bulletin.

And of course, we will be rocking our new logo until March 2022 !

The EU funded projects PIPS and I³PS targeted the energy saving of planes, within the Cleansky 2 research program, by developing a new anti-icing system.

Both projects enabled to develop a new technology (PIPS) and to test it under relevant environment (I³PS).

This new concept uses wasted heat from the engine to bring it to the Engine Air Intake zone of turbo propeller planes which must be protected against icing.

The project PIPS developed a new system of Capillary Pumped Loop (CPL, patent pending) to be used to protect against icing the engine air intake of a mid size turboprop aircraft using hot air as heat source.

The system was tested in laboratory with a 1:1 scale model (TRL4) showing heat transport capability exceeding the requirements (7.2 kW transport weighting less than 10kg). Able to adapt to various flight situations, the CPL is automatically controlled and almost completely passive as it spends less than 2% of the transported heat for this.

Within the frame of the I³PS project, the concept was modified to integrate the condenser within the skin itself of the Engine Air Intake. Finally, the prototype was tested for the first time in an Icing Wind Tunnel. With an icing air from ambient to -30°C and airspeed from 0 to 80m/s, the concept was able to transport up to 8.8kW and showed the potential for use as ice protection (test showed that high accretion areas needed a fine detail which was not possible to finish during the project).

With the unique possibility of controlling the working temperature of the fluid in the system loop, independently of the hot source, the concept is validated in a relevant environment and adaptable to many applications.

Another great capillary pumped loop made by EHP !

The Eurostar Neo Deployment and Pointing System, developed by Airbus Defense and Space (F) and Euro Heat Pipes (B) in the frame of ESA’s Neosat Partnership Project, is qualified and ready for flight.

The new Airbus Defense and Space Eurostar Neo satellite product line offers one of the largest communication payload capacities on the world market. This is in particular enabled by the Deployment and Pointing System which repositions the electric thrusters throughout the mission to optimise system performance.

The Deployment and Pointing System, developed by Airbus Defense and Space (F) and EHP (B), under test in Airbus Toulouse facility (Image credit: Airbus Defense and Space)

Qualification testing of the Deployable and Pointing System has recently been completed, covering all aspects of environmental, functional and performance requirements, including hold-down, release, and arm deployment sequences. In-orbit validation is planned in 2021, on-board the first Eurostar Neo mission.

Fourteen Neosat satellites have now been ordered, demonstrating the high economic impact of ESA’s Partnership Projects, which also foster the development of sustainable end-to-end systems up to in-orbit validation.

The objective of the Neosat Partnership Projects is to develop and qualify the next generation platforms allowing the two European satellite prime integrators, Airbus DS and Thales Alenia Space (TAS) to deliver competitive satellites for the commercial satellite market. The projects include development up to in-orbit validation of the new platform product lines for both Prime contractors, Eurostar Neo for Airbus DS and Spacebus Neo for Thales Alenia Space.

Neosat is part of ESA’s Advanced Research in Telecommunications Systems (ARTES) programme and is based on a cooperation between ESA and CNES.

Source :https://artes.esa.int/node/119589