Electric propulsion (EP) system will be used for station keeping in several geosynchronous earth orbit (GEO) satellite platforms in China. The 80 mN Hall thruster with specific impulse of 1 600 s is recognized as the most suitable thruster for this mission. It is also the most widely applied electric thruster for satellite and deep space mission abroad. To meet the service life of 15 years for GEO satellites, the Hall thruster must work for at least 7 500 hours & 8 000 times of ignition. As an important component of thruster, the hollow cathode's life and ignition time must meet the corresponding requirements. Therefore, the ground life test of two hollow cathodes of 80 mN Hall thruster for space application was conducted in Shanghai Institute of Space Propulsion (SISP). The test was performed in triode configuration mode simulating the thruster anode in order to simulate the conditions in the real thruster operation. By early August 2013, the hollow cathode No.1 had been equirements. The two hollow cathodes have small changes in discharge voltage, keeper voltage and ignition time during the tests. The test is still in process.
References:
[1]TILLEY D L, WILLMES G F. Flight hollow cathode for hall thruster applications, AIAA 98-3339[R]. USA: AIAA, 1998.