Front-end Robotics Enabling Near-term Demonstration

The Front-end Robotics Enabling Near-term Demonstration (FREND, a play on friend) is a DARPA project "aiming to create a fully autonomous docking capability for satellites that weren't built to be serviced", currently under testing at the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory Spacecraft Engineering Department.[1]

Not to be confused with Fine-Resolution Epithermal Neutron Detector.

The FREND mission concept uses robotic arms to position a grappling tool at a customer spacecraft structural hardpoint, and docks the two spacecraft together by first rigidizing this tool, then rigidizing the positioning robotics.[2] FREND has been described as a robotic manipulator technology "that someday could potentially deliver fuel, provide repairs, or reposition satellites."[3]

References
  1. "To Test A Satellite Dock, DARPA Built a 37-Ton Air Hockey Table". Gizmodo.com. Retrieved 2012-09-23.
  2. "FREND:Pushing the Envelope of Space Robotics" (PDF). Nrl.navy.mil. Retrieved 2012-09-23.
  3. Alfred W. McCoy, Beyond Bayonets and Battleships - Space Warfare and the Future of U.S. Global Power, Tom Dispatch, 2012-11-08


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