Remote IR Temperature Measurement For Microgravity Experiment

A remote temperature sensor has been developed to measure the temperature of a metal alloy in microgravity conditions, on board an automatic and sealed experimental station in the Space Shuttle. The device is composed of an optical system, that allows thermal radiation from the hot body to pass through an orifice in the oven, and focus onto an infrared detector whose output photocurrent is a function of temperature. The experiment is fully microcomputer controlled, and temperature data is both, utilized to control the heating path, and stored in the memory for postflight analysis. In this paper, design, construction, calibration, testing and performance of the system are described.