RedShift Design and Engineering

RedShift
Design and Engineering BVBA

FluidPac

FluidPac integrated into the Foton 12 re-entry
capsule (during interface tests)

The Fluid Physics Facility (FluidPac) is a complex autonomous facility for fluid physics research in microgravity conditions. It is launched on a Russian Foton satellite for a typical 3 weeks flight. Several experiments are run sequentially. The FluidPac facility provides high accuracy thermal regulation and multiple optical diagnostics (including interferometers and IR observation).
(more FluidPac pictures)

The facility has been developed for ESA by a European consortium headed by Verhaert. After the first FluidPac flight (Foton 12 mission in September 1999) the project manager and system engineer left Verhaert and founded RedShift.

RedShift provided technical support to the industrial team that was preparing the second FluidPac flight (FluidPac2, featuring a new set of experiments). This consultancy ranged from training new team members to solving dedicated technical problems in the design of new experiment cells.

Unfortunately the FluidPac facility flight model was destroyed due to a failure of the Soyuz launcher carrying the Foton M-1 satellite (October 2002, FluidPac2 recovery pictures).
The FluidPac facility qualification model was upgraded in order to perform the FluidPac2 set of experiments during the Foton M-2 flight (June 2005). This flight was fully successful.

Related pages:
TAS2 project
RedShift reference projects

RedShiftDesign and Engineering BVBA

FluidPac

RedShift
Design and Engineering BVBA