Our Crowdfunding Groups
Our Mission:
inspireFly’s mission is to design and develop a novel 1U satellite that presents a unique opportunity to access space for the general public while demonstrating new technologies for future satellite and space vehicle applications.
We will present diverse, quickly-accessible, and affordable space opportunities worldwide through our satellite, ContentCube, while expanding capabilities in the space environment. Our team is driven by its core values of inspiration, diversity, effectiveness, ambition, and sincerity.
Who We Are:
We are a Virginia Tech interdisciplinary undergraduate CubeSat design team consisting of majors from across the university including Aerospace, Mechanical, Computer Science, Electrical, Industrial, and Materials Science Engineering, Business Information Technology, Finance & Business Law, and Marketing & Management.
In 2018, inspireFly participated in a national space exploration competition, SEDS SAT-II, where we won the grand prize: a fully funded launch. Our projected launch date is in Q4 of 2022. With your help, we can fund the final part of our satellite’s construction and complete our mission while providing you with an innovative space experience.
Our executive team has attended and contributed to some of the most notable space conferences and competitions in the world. In January 2020, inspireFly presented at the 5th International Academy of Astronautics (IAA) conference, and in early March 2020, we presented at Paris Space Week.
Why Launch ContentCube?
ContentCube provides users with a one-of-a-kind space interaction that has not ever been available before. Imagine a real image of you and your family orbiting earth at 7,000 miles per hour! Once displayed on ContentCube’s external display, our camera will take a snapshot of this monumental moment for people to cherish forever. Our brilliant team of engineers has worked for over four years to make this dream become reality.
ContentCube is an enabling catalyst for furthering personalized space experiences, space tourism potential, and technological advancement in outer space via patent-pending external display screen technology.
Problem: Personalized access to outer space on the ground for tourism or scientific research is expensive. Commercial spaceflight options cost millions of dollars. 63% of Millennials say that they are ‘definitely interested in space tourism,” with the majority wanting to “experience something unique.” Almost 30% of U.S. adults say that space tourism is “too expensive.” Conducting experimental, technology, and scientific research on the ISS is restricted and expensive.
Solution: ContentCube will validate an external display screen in the space environment using a CubeSat platform. Users from around the world will be able to submit content to be displayed on the screen and then photographed, selfie-style, with Earth in the background.
How You Can Help:
We need your help in funding the purchase of materials and components that will be directly implemented in the build of our satellite, ContentCube.
Expenses include but are not limited to:
More Giving Levels Can Be Found At The Bottom
The team currently uses software such as STK, Ansys, and reTort for modeling and analysis. Some of these softwares require the purchase of licenses in order to use them.
Join our mailing list for up-to-date insider information on the progress of ContentCube, updates from the team members, and more exclusive inspireFly content!
A key component of the ContentCube payload is the monitor. The inspireFly team still has multiple display monitor options on the table that need to go through further testing before being down-selected.
Various additional testing components are required to complete the testing phase before our Critical Design Review. Many of these components are for the vacuum chamber our team has built such as power and data cords and pump controllers.
Given a successful launch, you will have first access to upload images to be displayed on ContentCube.
The Vector Nav 100 is an $800 inertial measurement unit system that will report the specific gravity and angular rate of the CubeSat. This component is essential to the attitude determination and controls system. Purchasing this component will allow for more in depth testing of our attitude, determination, and control systems in the Virginia Tech Helmholtz cage.
The Ximea camera is the most promising yet most expensive camera option for the payload at the moment. For more objective camera testing and the later build, it’s important that the team purchases four of these cameras. In total, these cameras will cost $2,700.
The antenna system is critical to the transmission of data to and from the CubeSat. The antenna system we have selected has a high price point at $6,500, but its extensive flight heritage and reliability justify such a high price. Purchasing the antenna system will allow us to test our communication system prior to a complete build.
An engineering model is crucial to testing integration of various components. Not only would the purchase of an engineering model allow the inspireFly team to practice building the CubeSat before building the flight model, the engineering model could also be used by other VT CubeSat teams in the future. The engineering model is expected to cost the team about $25,000 total.
Becoming a VIP inspireFly supporter grants access to our executive panel personal discussions, zoom updates, and Q&As with the team.
The KRATOS bus is the basis of the entire ContentCube design. Due to budget constraints, we are currently planning to purchase the KRATOS 1A bus. However, the 1B bus has additional customization options including 10W solar arrays and NEMEA shielding which would allow our team to have more component/design options, better thermal regulation, and protection against radiation. The total cost of the flight model KRATOS bus will be between $42,000 and $65,000.