Handbook of Spacecraft Systems Engineering: Principles and Methods for Mission Design, Propulsion, Structures, Avionics, Guidance and Control, ... Communications, Integration, and Verification - Softcover

V. Long, Kenneth

9798176542240: Handbook of Spacecraft Systems Engineering: Principles and Methods for Mission Design, Propulsion, Structures, Avionics, Guidance and Control, ... Communications, Integration, and Verification

Softcover

ISBN 13: 9798176542240

Publisher: Independently published, 2026

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Understand the Spacecraft as a Complete Engineering System

A spacecraft is more than a collection of sophisticated components. Structures, propulsion, avionics, power, thermal control, communications, guidance, and payloads must operate together within demanding limits of mass, energy, data, pointing accuracy, reliability, and mission risk.

Handbook of Spacecraft Systems Engineering provides a practical, structured guide to the principles and methods behind spacecraft development—from early mission requirements and architecture through subsystem design, integration, verification, launch, and on-orbit operations.

Designed as both a technical learning resource and professional reference, this handbook connects engineering fundamentals with the methods used to evaluate design trades, manage interfaces and resource budgets, analyze performance, and verify an integrated spacecraft.

Inside, you'll discover how to:

Develop spacecraft requirements, architectures, interfaces, margins, and engineering trade studies
Apply orbital mechanics and mission design to orbit selection, transfers, ground tracks, launch windows, and maneuvers
Analyze chemical and electric propulsion, thrust, specific impulse, delta-V budgets, propellant requirements, and tank sizing
Understand spacecraft structures, mechanisms, materials, loads, vibration, shock, and structural verification
Explore avionics, command and data handling, flight computers, data buses, telemetry, fault management, and flight software
Work with guidance, navigation, and control, attitude determination, sensors, actuators, reaction wheels, and pointing performance
Evaluate electrical power systems, including solar arrays, batteries, distribution, redundancy, and power budgets
Understand thermal management, heat transfer, passive and active control, modeling, and thermal testing
Study spacecraft communications, antennas, RF systems, modulation, link budgets, ground stations, and data return
Integrate payloads while managing mechanical, electrical, thermal, data, and alignment interfaces
Navigate assembly, environmental testing, reliability, redundancy, risk management, and verification
Follow launch, separation, commissioning, anomaly response, mission operations, and end-of-life planning

The handbook goes beyond theory with worked engineering examples, equations, defined variables, SI units, intermediate calculations, subsystem tables, design-trade data, and chapter-level key takeaways.

From Mission Requirements to Flight-Ready Hardware

The challenge of spacecraft engineering is not simply understanding individual subsystems—it is understanding how they interact. A change in payload power, for example, can affect thermal rejection, solar-array sizing, spacecraft mass, attitude dynamics, and mission performance. The handbook develops this systems-level perspective through shared mass, power, data, pointing, and thermal budgets.

Extensive reference material includes key equations, orbital mechanics formulas, spacecraft structural material properties, space-environment data, aerospace standards guidance, and worked problems with solutions.

Whether you are an aerospace engineering student, graduate student, spacecraft engineer, systems engineer, researcher, educator, or technical professional, this handbook provides an organized resource for understanding spacecraft architecture, subsystem design, engineering tradeoffs, integration, testing, verification, and operations.

Build the systems perspective needed to understand how spacecraft are designed, integrated, verified, and prepared for flight.

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