Rocket Lab Rolls Out Software-Defined Radio and Reaction Wheels for Small Satellites

Rocket Lab 12Nms reaction wheel in production. Photo: Rocket Lab/Business Wire

Rocket Lab is rolling out two new space systems products for small satellites, a new software-defined radio and reaction wheels. These new components add to the company’s line of products for manufacturing small satellites from solar power to mission software, separation systems, star trackers, radios, and reaction wheels. 

The new Frontier-X radio is a radio frequency (RF) transceiver, designed to provide high speed data for both near Earth and deep space small satellite missions. The X-band radio packs Deep Space Network (DSN) waveforms, two-way doppler and regenerative ranging, beacon modes, and low baud rates enabled by low power digital signal processing (DSP) in a low mass solution. 

The new 12Nms reaction wheel was developed to expand the company’s attitude control solutions. The ​​12Nms reaction wheel is ideal for attitude control of spacecraft with masses as high as 600-650 kg and lifetimes as long as 12 years. It is under production and available immediately. 

Rocket Lab is seeing growth in its Space Systems business, and its components have supported more than 1,700 space missions to date. In the past year, Rocket Lab completed building a high-volume manufacturing line for satellite reaction wheels capable of producing up to 2,000 units per year.