EGSE AND MISSION CONTROL SYSTEM (EMCS)

The Swedish Space Corporation carries out projects developing, integrating, validating, and operating various types of space systems – satellites, sounding rockets, space subsystems, and experiment equipment for research in microgravity. Throughout the entire lifecycle of such a project, it is essential to have access to a monitoring and control system to be able to validate, integrate, verify, and operate the different space segments. Therefore, the access to an inexpensive, easily configurable monitoring and control system is of great importance to a company like ours.

For the last 30 years, Swedish Space Corporation has built its own applications for monitoring and control of the space segment. The earlier monitoring and control system was running on a PC network, based on DOS and using the PCM communication protocol.

As missions become more and more advanced, a complex monitoring and control system has become necessary. The communication standards CCSDS and ECSS PUS have been introduced. It is required to use the same monitoring and control system within all our internal projects (both satellites and sounding rockets) without any tailoring effort for specific project needs. It is possible to use the same system for both EGSE and for operations. More advanced graphical user interfaces are required to meet the demand for monitoring several spacecraft and several thousands of telemetry parameters at the same time. Automated procedure execution is required to decrease time and cost of the integration and validation phases of the projects.

The goal has been to use our experience from 30 years of development of monitoring and control systems to develop a general EGSE and Mission Control System for both sounding rockets and multi-satellite missions. The system is based on Windows, using CCSDS communications standards and support for ECSS PUS where all project specific information is stored in a separate database.
The working name became “Rocket and Multi-Satellite EMCS Software”, and as the RAMSES acronym was rather obvious, it led us deeper into “Egyptophoria”, which in time transformed the names and graphical appearance of the entire system into what we see today. The RAMSES applications have received their names from Egyptian Gods with tasks and abilities that are similar to those of the applications. As an example, Osiris, with the ability to bring the dead back to life, is the namesake of the application that handles data playback.

_________________________________________________________

A GENERAL EGSE AND MISSION CONTROL SYSTEM FOR BOTH SATELLITES AND SOUNDING ROCKETS

RAMSES (Rocket and Multi-Satellite EMCS Software) is a new generation general control system that includes the core functionality of a mission control system while offering great advantages compared to other control systems available on the market. The system can be applied to both satellite and sounding rocket missions and is designed to be used during the development, integration, validation, and operational phases, thereby significantly decreasing project costs.


FEATURES AND BENEFITS

• Open network interface (UDP) with loosely coupled modules.
• Runs on standard PC network.
• Distributed network architecture.
• Data available on all levels for debug purposes.
• Easy integration with cooperating subsystems and COTS applications.
• Support for ECSS PUS such as onboard command scheduling monitoring, command verification monitoring, and event monitoring.
• Accommodates design and construction of user specific Mimic-boards.
• Automated procedure execution (PLUTO).
• Synthetic parameters (SPEL).