Lightweight optical barrel assembly structures for large deployable space telescopes

Future space based telescopes will need apertures and focal lengths that exceed the dimensions of the launch vehicle shroud. In addition to deploying the primary mirror and secondary mirror support structure, these large telescopes must also deploy the stray light and thermal barriers needed to ensure proper telescope performance. The authors present a deployable light and thermal optical barrel assembly approach for a very large telescope with a variable sun angle and fast slew rate. The Strain Energy Deployable Optical Barrel Assembly (SEDOBA) uses elastic composite hinges to power the deployment of a hierarchical truss structure that supports the thermal and stray light shroud material that form the overall system. The paper describes the overall design approach, the key component technologies, and the design and preliminary testing of a self deploying scale model prototype.