Innovative on-board computer for space robot

An on-board computer system for the first Chinese intelligent space robotic system was presented. A fault tolerance design on on-board computer (OBC) was proposed that allows commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) devices to be incorporated into dual processing modules of on-board computer. The processing module is composed of 32-bit ARM RISC processor and other COTS devices. This innovative approach deeply relies on light weight/low cost equipment development using commercial miniaturized parts and non-space qualified technologies. As well as, a set of fault handling mechanisms was implemented in the computer system. The on-board software was organized around a set of processes that communicate between each other through a routing process. The qualification experiment shows that the fault tolerant on-board computer has excellent data processing capability and is enough to meet the demanding of the extremely tight constraints on mass, volume, power consumption and space environmental conditions.