1. California State University, Northridge
Mechanical Engineering Department
2015-2016
Aerospace / RASC-AL Senior Design Project
Team Captain Final Report
Jasmine Wong
California State University, Northridge
Mechanical Engineering Department
18111 Nordhoff Street Northridge, CA 91330

2. 1
Table of Contents
List of Figures and Tables............................................................................................................... 1
Introduction..................................................................................................................................... 2
Competitions................................................................................................................................... 2
RASC-AL ................................................................................................................................... 2
AIAA Region VI Student Conference ........................................................................................ 2
Senior Design Project Showcase ................................................................................................ 3
Team Dynamics .............................................................................................................................. 3
Leadership................................................................................................................................... 3
Subgroups ................................................................................................................................... 3
Communication........................................................................................................................... 5
Design Process and Subsystem Integration .................................................................................... 5
Requirement Identification ......................................................................................................... 5
Innovation ................................................................................................................................... 6
System-Level Trade Studies ....................................................................................................... 6
Integration................................................................................................................................... 7
Timelines..................................................................................................................................... 7
Project Timeline...................................................................................................................... 7
Mission Timeline .................................................................................................................... 8
Industry and Faculty Collaboration ................................................................................................ 9
Major Lessons Learned................................................................................................................... 9
Suggestions ................................................................................................................................... 10
Conclusion .................................................................................................................................... 10
Appendix....................................................................................................................................... 10
References..................................................................................................................................... 11
List of Figures and Tables
Table 1: 2016 RASC-AL Themes................................................................................................... 2
Table 2: Team member assigned subgroups................................................................................... 4
Table 3: Project timeline................................................................................................................. 7
Table 4: Mission timeline. .............................................................................................................. 8

3. 2
Introduction
This senior design team was created to provide an opportunity for Mechanical Engineering Seniors
to design a system using computer aided engineering methods and to avoid the costly process of
prototyping. The team participated in three competitions, one by the Institute of Aerospace and
NASA, an AIAA regional student paper conference, and CSUN’s Senior Design Showcase. The
team consisted of 26 Mechanical Engineering Seniors under the advisement by Dr. Peter Bishay.
A five page design abstract, 15 page technical paper, two presentations, a project display, and final
department design report were the required deliverables of the project year. Industry and faculty
collaboration was utilized for our team to learn and apply as much and as quickly as possible. As
team captain, the competitions entered, team dynamics, design process, industry and faculty
collaboration, lessons learned, and suggestions for future project teams are addressed in this report.
Competitions
This section covers the competition basics with a few team-decision details. The majority of the
deliverables details and team dynamics are discussed in later sections.
RASC-AL
The team was informed in September, 2015 that we would be competing in an National Institute
of Aerospace, NIA, and NASA university-level design competition, the Revolutionary Aerospace
Systems Concepts Academic Linkage (RASC-AL)1
. The RASC-AL competition was focused on
the overall mission architecture and provided four themes from which the participating design
teams could choose that provided constraints and requirements for the aerospace design2
. The 2016
themes provided are summarized in table 1. Our team, after review of the previous RASC-AL
winning technical reports, chose to design an Earth-Independent 1G Space Station. This was
chosen after two days of group discussion and two rounds of voting. The runner up theme was the
Lunar Ice-Trap ISRU Mining, Processing and Storage Infrastructure. A five page design abstract
was submitted to RASC-AL on January 14th
to be reviewed for determination if the team would
continue in the competition.
Table 1: 2016 RASC-AL Themes.
Theme Mission Timeframe
Crew-Tended Co-Orbiting ISS Facility 2015-2020’s
Lunar Ice-Trap ISRU Mining Processing and Storage Infrastructure 2015-2035
Crewed Mars Moons Mission 2015-2035
Earth-Independent 1G Space Station 2015-2045
AIAA Region VI Student Conference
Following notification that the RASC-AL abstract was not chosen to continue with the
competition, we chose to submit a technical paper abstract to the 2016 AIAA Region VI Student
Conference3
. This abstract was accepted and our team submitted a 15 page AIAA technical paper
for the conference and eight representatives presented at the conference on April 2nd
, 2016 at the
University of Oregon in Corvallis, OR.

4. 3
At the conference, the team’s eight representatives had a chance to speak with the AIAA Executive
Director and retired ISS astronaut, Dr. Sandy Magnus, and Johnson Space Center Contractor,
Daniel Adamo. These two conversations validated a lot of what we had learned and attempted to
apply through the design process. It was also requested of us that we send the video used in the
presentation to the regional director, Oleg Yakimenko, for potential use in a webpage newsletter
on the AIAA website.
Senior Design Project Showcase
The 2015-2016 College of Engineering and Computer Science Senior Design Project Showcase
was held April 15th
. The team participated in both the Presentation and Display categories. The
Presentation was performed by members of the team who had participated in the AIAA Student
Conference presentation. The Display allowed members of the team to present the project who had
no previous opportunity.
Team Dynamics
The team overcame their lack of aerospace and system engineering knowledge by dedicating the
majority of the team effort from September to January to learning about our chosen subgroup
disciplines. The leadership and subgroup responsibilities and member lists are summarized here.
Leadership
As team Captain, I was responsible for the project timeline, meeting schedule, industry and faculty
collaboration, subgroup assignment, communication, project-level deliverable preparation, and
subsystem integration. I assisted with trade studies due to my overall project knowledge and made
design decisions based on the suggestions and desired design directions of the subgroups.
I met with the advisor, Dr. Peter Bishay, on a near-weekly basis at the beginning of the project
year. Our initial focus was to understand the RASC-AL competition details and to make sure that
the subgroups were assigned. Following the establishment of the subgroups, and as they researched
and began their designs, Dr. Bishay and I were focused on faculty and industry collaboration. Late
in November, the focus switched to making sure the project would be developed enough to compile
the subgroups’ designs to write the RASC-AL Abstract.
Following this submission and notification that our team was not chosen to continue in the RASC-
AL competition, I was responsible for preparing the team and deliverables for the AIAA Regional
Conference. This included the re-activation of an AIAA Student Chapter in able for our team to
participate in the Conference. After the Conference, effort was switched to preparing the team and
deliverables for the Senior Design Showcase and preparing the final lead report.
Subgroups
Table 2 lists the team members and their assigned subgroups for the Fall 2015 and Spring 2016
semesters. Table A.1 in the appendix shows the “extra” involvement of the team members, this
includes the dedicated team that worked over the winter break to prepare the design for the RASC-
AL Abstract submission, the members who volunteered as the CSUN AIAA student chapter
officers, those who participated in the conference and showcase presentations and display, the

5. 4
three members who created the 3D printed models, and the student responsible for the presentation
video used in the AIAA Student Conference and CECS Senior Design Showcase Presentations.
Table 2: Team member assigned subgroups.
Subgroup/ExtraInvolvement
1GMethod
Budget
Communications
Configuration
ISRUs
LifeSupport
NASALunarMissions
Power
Propulsion
RoboticsandMaintenance
Structures
Thermal
First Last
Ahmad Alhaila
Mohammed Alkandari
Ebraheem Allanqawi
Abdulaziz Alrashed
Megerditch Arabian
Melissa Aryal
Brian Bolves
Claudiu Caldarescu
James Chan
Jesse Correll
Matthew Decker
Ricky Dinger
Jorge Garcia
Randall Harrington
Dosan Jyenis
Edward Kocharyan
Joseph Lewis
Maite Lopez
Jorge Ortiz
Rizel Podadera
Gary Sanders
Josef Staley
Francisco Tadeo
Qianyi Teng
Joshua Werner
Jasmine Wong Team Captain

6. 5
Communication
The official form of team design communication were weekly progress reports and presentations.
The design progress reports from the subgroups were due every Friday and presentations from
each subgroup were done on Wednesdays. The presentations allowed for inter-group discussion
and input. This made it possible to discuss subsystem design changes so the other subgroups could
adjust as needed to ensure overall system cohesiveness. This encouraged a system-level mindset
in the team members and contributed to an overall design that was integrated throughout the
process.
Two cumulative design reports were required of the subgroups. One was due before the winter
break and the other before the AIAA Technical Paper was prepared. This required the subgroups
to make distinct decisions based on their research, current design, and best engineering
judgements.
Design Process and Subsystem Integration
Requirement Identification
The project scope and requirements were determined throughout the design process. Although this
is typically done before the project begins, I had to learn how to identify requirements at the same
time that design work was being done by the team. To get the team started in the right direction
and mindset, I analyzed the problem statement provided to determine the scope of the project.
From the 2016 RASC-AL problem statement, the expansion of human presence in space was
identified as the over-arching need. The ability to support multi-generational life independent from
Earth resupply was our team’s goal, created to help meet that need. In order to achieve this goal
three main objectives were defined; a 1G Space Station infrastructure, a space-based life support
system, and a resupply system. Two important factors defined these design objectives in terms of
feasibility; the location and lifespan of SEARCH. These two factors are discussed in the Trade
Studies section.
The problem statement provided requirements in terms of the mission timeline, number of crew,
resupply, and budget. The mission was given 20-30 years, starting in 2015, for technology
development and infrastructure construction, with an operational start-date between 2030 and
2040. Once operational, the station must be Earth-resupply independent after 5 years. A crew of
16-24 people must continuously live in a 1G environment on a space station. Resupply is allowed,
but must not be Earth-based.
The budget requirements stated that NASA is assumed to have a flat $16 Billion overall budget
throughout the design years. All current NASA programs could be reduced by up to 20%.
However, the ISS and SLS/Orion programs are exceptions to this and must be fully funded up
through 2024 and 2030, respectively. The budget requirement details were clarified through the
RASC-AL Frequently Asked Questions webpage and a Question and Answer Webinar held
November 18th
. Essentially it was determined that SEARCH’s program would have access to the
entire Human Exploration and Operations Mission Directorate (HEOMD) budget and 20% of the
remaining NASA budget4
.

7. 6
Innovation
Judged strongly on our design’s feasibility and innovation, a unique challenge arose in leadership
of the team. There was a healthy amount of applicable mechanical engineering knowledge on the
team. However, there was very little knowledge by way of the aerospace field. This included
knowing the current state of the art. So to be required to innovate in this field within which we
were very new, was a supreme challenge. Some members of the team were able to learn quickly
and then turn around and be creative and think outside of what they had learned. Other members
were able to learn quickly, but struggled and balked at the requirement to consider ideas beyond
that which had already been done. Most major trade study decisions were a balance between my
desire, as project lead, to pull the design beyond the “comfortable” and their engineering
knowledge in the subsystems that defined feasibility.
System-Level Trade Studies
As mentioned previously, the location and lifespan of SEARCH were key goals and boundaries
that defined the subsystem requirements. The initial argument was a 60-year Earth-independent
time period where two generations would be born and grow to full maturity. This was deemed an
excessively long time that was not feasible in terms of durability of the station equipment, even
with assumed regolith ISRU material availability for on-station manufacturing of replacement and
repair parts. It was determined that the birth and full maturity of a single generation and the birth
and adolescence of a second was enough time to serve the defined purpose of SEARCH as a life-
in-space and reproduction-in-space experiment. This equated to only 30 years, a lifespan
determined to be more feasible than 60 years.
The location of SEARCH was determined and changed twice during the design year. Initially, a
more innovative choice, a modified Aldrin-cycler orbit was chosen to place SEARCH in a situation
where Martian and interplanetary research could be performed over the duration of the experiment.
The “modified” portion of this Earth-Mars cycler was that every couple years, SEARCH would
break out of the Aldrin orbit to orbit exclusively around Mars for a period of time to collect
resupply materials, including water, fuel, and regolith, from Mars and its moons. After a few weeks
of intensive research and calculations, it was determined by the Propulsion subgroup that not
enough was known about the orbital mechanics of the Aldrin-cycler to say that the benefits of the
innovation would offset the cost in fuel and danger to the crew in case of catastrophic system
failure. A Martian orbit was chosen as a replacement.
A Mars Aerosyncronous Orbit (MAO) of 17,000 km was chosen for proximity to Mars, Phobos,
and Deimos as well as the full, continuous sunlight available for station power production for two
seasons of the Martian year. This was the orbit presented in the RASC-AL Abstract submission in
January. However, after research into the current state of ISRU technology and the timeline
available for development, production, and launch, it was deemed unlikely that the ISRU units
could produce enough fuel for SEARCH to make a return trip to Earth. Moreover, it was
determined that to launch the acquired fuel and water from the ISRU units on the Martian surface
to SEARCH was too costly in terms of the launch vehicle fuel. With these issues making a Martian
orbit not feasible, a lunar orbit was chosen.
The final location decision was between a lunar orbit and an Earth orbit. While the Earth orbit
would be the safest, cheapest, and fastest, it was not chosen because it did not expand humanity’s

8. 7
reach into space. Humanity already has the International Space Station in LEO so it was decided
that to further humanity’s permanent reach into space, SEARCH would be placed in lunar orbit so
that it can serve as a 1G way-station between Earth and Mars after the experiment concludes.
Having SEARCH permanently in lunar orbit allowed for the relatively fast and easy return of crew
to Earth via capsules. It also removed the fuel requirements for the station return to Earth. This
orbit was presented in the AIAA Student Conference paper and presentation.
Integration
Even with weekly progress reports and presentations, it was difficult to get the teams to
communicate their changes and needs. This was especially difficult because, through our research,
new things were being learned at the same time the design was being created. It often happened
that a subgroup’s weekly presentation would bring to light the need for a near-complete redesign
of another subsystem.
Another difficulty we faced was in the subsystem calculations. Due to our lack of knowledge about
aerospace systems, the important mass, life support, propulsion, and power numbers had to be
over-estimated for the majority of the design year. It wasn’t until March/April, 2016 that our team
began to feel confident in our number estimations, but even then, issues with assumption changes
not being propagated throughout a subsystem’s design severely affected our accuracy in the
deliverables we had to submit during this time. However, despite these difficulties, the design
produced by the team showed a dedication to integration and a consideration of the overall system
throughout the design process.
Timelines
Project Timeline
Presentations were done on Wednesdays so that design changes could be made through the
weekend and Mondays were set aside for subgroup collaboration. Major deadlines and dates are
summarized in Table 3.
Table 3: Project timeline.
Month Day Deadline/ Important Event Month Day Deadline/ Important Event
August 22 First Meeting January 17 RASC-AL Abstract Deadline
September 9 Theme Choice Discussion I January 25 First meeting of Spring Semester
September 14 Theme Choice Discussion II February 15 AIAA Paper Abstract Deadline
September 14 Subgroup Preferences Due March 9 Subgroup Design Report II Due
September 21 Begin Industry Collaboration March 14 AIAA Technical Paper Deadline
November 2 Aerojet Rocketdyne-Structures April 1 AIAA Conference
November 5 Boeing Spectrolab-Power April 15 CECS Senior Design Showcase
November 12 Lead Meeting with Dr. Gandhi February 15
AIAA Conference Paper Abstract
Deadline
November 17 CSUN Fuel Cell-Power March 9 Subgroup Design Report II Due
November 28 Finish Industry Collaboration March 14
AIAA Conference Technical Paper
Deadline
December 14 Subgroup Design Report I Due April 1 AIAA Conference
January 8 RASC-AL Abstract due for Team April 15 CECS Senior Design Showcase
January 14 RASC-AL Abstract submitted

9. 8
Mission Timeline
Based primarily on budget requirements, Table 4 shows the extended timeline for the development
for and infrastructural buildup of SEARCH. The majority of research and development occurs
before 2025 to ensure technology readiness for manufacturing and Low Earth Orbit (LEO)
assembly. System integration is scheduled to begin in year 2031. Once assembly is complete in
LEO and life support systems are operational, the first four members of the experiment crew will
launch, board SEARCH, and finish the system integration and testing. In 2035, the station is “spun-
up” to the rotational speed required for 1G environment, this is indicated by the red line in Table
4. After this time, 1G-dependent systems will be installed, the remaining 12 members of the crew
will launch to SEARCH, and reliability verification of all Earth-independent systems will occur
between 2035 and 2040. This phase takes place while SEARCH is in LEO so that backup supplies
and food can be launched to the station before the Earth-independent experiment begins in 2040.
Table 4: Mission timeline.
Structure/RM
Propulsion
LifeSupport
Power
ThermalandShielding
ISRUs
Assembly
CrewSelection
EmergencySystem
Structure/RM
Propulsion
LifeSupport
ISRUs
CommunicationSystem
PowerSystems
ThermalandShielding
EmergencyEvacSystem
SuppliesandEquipment
SLSLaunch1
SLSLaunch2
FalconHeavyLaunch1
FalconHeavyLaunch2
FalconHeavyLaunch3
Falcon9DragonLaunch
Falcon9DragonLaunch
AssemblySetupandTesting
Assembly
SystemsIntegration
2015
2016
2017
2018
2019
2020
2021
2022
2023
2024
2025
2026
2027
2028
2029
2030
2031
2032
2033
2034
2035
2036
2037
2038
2039
2040
AssemblyR&D Manufacturing Launches

10. 9
Industry and Faculty Collaboration
The conversations and tours the team members had with industry professionals and CSUN faculty
helped validate design decisions and guide the subgroups in more fruitful directions. Information
gleaned from the meetings always led to more confident design improvements that research alone
did not provide. Of the ten companies and faculty members that I contacted, seven provided
feedback and/or met with a team member or subgroup.
Dr. Youping Gao at Aerojet Rocketdyne met with the Structures team to discuss in-orbit
manufacturing methods and other important factors to consider in space architecture. Dr. Gao also
took the subgroup on a tour of the facility and the group was able to see much of the propulsion
production floor and the 3D metal printing shop. Kaveh Rouhani at Boeing Spectrolab met with
the Power team and discussed solar cell state of the art and provided a tour of their production
facility. CSUN Professor Tom Brown met with and took the Power team on a tour of the CSUN
Fuel Cell facility. CSUN professor Dr. S. Jimmy Gandhi met with me to describe systems
engineering and give advice on how to encourage team system-level thinking and innovation.
CSUN Professor Tim Fox provided feedback on the RASC-AL Abstract and the AIAA
Presentation practice held on March 30th
. Kevin Schoonover from Frontier Aerospace Corporation
in Simi Valley and CSUN’s Mechanical Engineering Department Chair, Dr. Hamid Johari, also
provided feedback on the AIAA Presentation practice.
Dave Berger of the Armstrong Flight Research Center (AFRC) expressed interest in helping the
team. However, this contact was not made until November and since the AFRC focuses primarily
on aeronautics, the usefulness of their assistance could not be determined. Todd Nygren of The
Aerospace Corporation had been in email contact with me and plans were in the process of being
made to have a few of their engineers come to CSUN and discuss systems engineering with the
team in October. By the beginning of November, this email conversation stagnated and no follow
up was made. Dr. Charles Volk of Northrop Grumman had made positive contact with Dr. Bishay
in early November and was willing to host a few of the team members to hear of the project at
their location in Woodland Hills or to send a few engineers to CSUN to discuss the project.
However, November was again deemed too late to begin collaboration planning and the lead was
not pursued.
Major Lessons Learned
Systems engineering is absolutely vital in large projects. As team lead, having no knowledge or
experience in identifying requirements made it difficult to guide design decisions and often left
the team working in an environment of nebulous expectations. I realized that the team did not have
a clear focus early in the design year and had to quickly learn how to define scope and identify
requirements from both the problem statement and as they arose in the subgroups’ research.
Delegation is a skill in which I was not particularly strong. I learned that I could not hold every
member of the team accountable and pushed for subgroup leads that would be held responsible for
their group’s work. This freed up my time to pursue industry collaboration, system integration,
and deliverable preparation.

11. 10
Suggestions
Arrange for systems engineering and engineering discipline (aerospace, marine, aeronautics…)
workshops very early in the design year. The whole team will understand the importance of
integration and have a primer on the discipline under which they will be designing.
Projects with a reduced scope would allow the majority of the team members to apply the
knowledge they had gained in engineering courses to the design. The majority of this year’s design
was spent learning the very basics of a discipline with which we were not at all familiar, with little
to no time for analysis or detailed design work.
Conclusion
I was the team captain of 26 Mechanical Engineering Seniors under the advisement of Dr. Peter
Bishay. The team participated in three competitions, producing a five page design abstract, 15 page
technical paper, two presentations, a project display, and final department design report. I was
responsible for industry and faculty collaboration, scheduling, requirement identification,
subgroup assignment, deliverable preparation, and subsystem integration. Team communication
was achieved by weekly progress reports and subgroup presentations. Requirement identification,
team design innovation, station location and lifespan, and subsystem integration were areas of
significant challenges and design decisions faced as team lead. The project and mission timelines
were summarized, as well as the industry and faculty collaboration arrangements. Finally, major
lessons learned and suggestions for future design teams were defined.
Appendix
Table A.1: Team member extra involvement.
Subgroup/ExtraInvolvement
WinterBreakTeam
AIAAStudentChapterOfficer
AIAAConferencePresentation
SeniorDesignShowcasePresentation
SeniorDesignShowcaseDisplay
3DPrinting
PresentationVideo
First Last
Megerditch Arabian
Melissa Aryal
Claudiu Caldarescu
Jesse Correll

12. 11
Matthew Decker
Randall Harrington
Dosan Jyenis
Edward Kocharyan
Joseph Lewis
Maite Lopez
Jorge Ortiz
Gary Sanders
Josef Staley
Francisco Tadeo
Qianyi Teng
Joshua Werner
Jasmine Wong
References
1
National Institute of Aerospace. “RASC-AL, Revolutionary Aerospace Systems Concepts
Academic Linkage.” NIA, 2016. Web. Rascal.nianet.org.
2
National Institute of Aerospace. “Call for RASC-AL Projects, 2016 RASC-AL Themes.”
NIA, 2016. Pdf.
3
American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics. “AIAA Region VI Student Conference.”
AIAA, Mar 2016. Web. Region6.aiaastudentconference.org.
4
National Institute of Aerospace. “RASC-AL, FAQs.” NIA, 2016. Web.
Rascal.nianet.org/faqs/.