Draft RFP Questions and Answers_final.pdf

Draft RFP

Industry Questions/Comments and Government Responses

1. Industry Comment: The CDRLs appear extensive with several “Approval” CDRLs that imply a more cost-plus style contract. Recommend the RFP streamline the CDRL count and authorities to better align with a commercial Class D mission.

Government Response: All CDRLs designated as “Approval” are required to support authorization of the GLIMR Milestone Payments (see Exhibit D in the Draft RFP). Their delivery, review, and approval timelines have been incorporated into the overall milestone schedule. The Government anticipates approving CDRLs that meet the expected maturity level within the GLIMR Milestone Review window.

Offerors may propose combining CDRLs or streamlining the associated milestone payments to better align with commercial approaches. However, the content addressed by these CDRLs is required to ensure mission success and therefore must still be provided, regardless of format or consolidation.

2. Industry Question: Can the PCU accommodate more weight/mass?

Government Response: The PCU could accommodate attached mass but would need specifications on this weight/mass so the Government could perform additional analysis, which would anticipate solution during oral presentation stage. Additional analysis would occur post contract award.

3. Industry Question: Power of the PCU seems inconsistent:

a. [GLIMR-REQ-46] states ~40W per side of the PCU, but an average of 65W (32.5 per side) over 180min.

i. Can NASA provide a shorter window, like 30 min average?

b. [GLIMR-REQ-74] states CBE for PCU peak power is 60W (30 per side), and a

CBE steady state is 48W (24W per side)

c. What value from above should we assume?

Government Response: The power values cited in the question refer to two different aspects of PCU performance: thermal dissipation and electrical consumption. These are defined separately in Exhibit C.

Thermal Power (What the PCU generates as heat):

Per Exhibit C, Section 4.4, requirement [GLIMR‑REQ‑47] PCU Peak Heat Dissipation specifies that the PCU must dissipate a peak of ≥ 80 W, averaged over any

10‑millisecond interval, allocated as 40 W per side.

Electrical Power (What the PCU requires to operate):

Exhibit C, Section 4.8.1 defines [GLIMR‑REQ‑74] PCU Power, which states that the

PCU requires at least 175 W peak operational electrical power, averaged over 10 milliseconds.

The values referenced in [GLIMR‑REQ‑46] and the CBE estimates (60 W peak, 48 W steady state) represent estimated electrical loads, but they do not replace or override the formal requirements in Exhibit C. For proposal purposes, offerors should assume the requirements in Exhibit C as the governing values.

Regarding a shorter averaging window (e.g., 30 minutes), the power and thermal requirements are defined at 10‑millisecond averaging intervals to bound peak loads. Once the payload has completed TVAC testing, shorter averaging windows could be supplied.

4. Industry Question: Does the PCU have an internal thermistor for reading the temperature on the thermal interface?

Government Response: Yes. The PCU includes internal thermistors, and these temperature measurements are provided through housekeeping data over the SpaceWire interface. These internal sensors support compliance with [GLIMR‑REQ‑133] PCU

Thermal Protection (TMON‑3), which requires monitoring of PCU thermal conditions to trigger the appropriate protection functions.

5. Industry Question: IF sensor is mounted on payload deck, a flip at SV noon is necessary. Thermal is assuming no direct sun onto the payload deck. In addition, the flip will prevent any sun from seeing the sensitive sensor radiator.

a. Can GLIMR payload tolerate a flip with full performance during payload ops with current gimbal and rate recording requirements?

b. If not, can it tolerate lower levels of precision pointing while doing the flip maneuver?

Government Response: The Government asked a clarifying question to understand the rationale behind why the Spacecraft/SV flip is needed due to the payload is designed and tested to take the direct sunlight without any thermal constraints. It was clarified that some Spacecraft/SV components couldn’t handle direct sunlight and thus the need for rotation of the Spacecraft/SV away from sunlight. GLIMR ATS offerors are responsible for operations, and the payload internal software does receive Spacecraft/SV orientation data to determine the gimbal rates and pointing location. So, the GLIMR payload potentially could be changed and flipped at that time, but further development and analysis are needed as this scenario has not been tested.

Alternatively, [GLIMR-REQ-143] states that the GLIMR Spacecraft shall limit GLIMR

Payload health and status and science data telemetry loss to 5% of the available measurement opportunities over each calendar month. The offeror could utilize this limit to delay data collection until after Spacecraft/SV flip, however, the offeror at the oral presentation will need to capture this with appropriate calculation of the estimated payload data loss.

6. Industry Question: Is the radiator backload requirement [GLIMR-REQ-56] only applicable to certain times of the mission or of each orbit?

Government Response: The radiator backload requirement in [GLIMR‑REQ‑56] applies only during periods when the payload is powered on. It is not applicable during transfer or transit to the final orbit or outside Spacecraft maneuvers.

7. Industry Question: What is the total number of survival heater circuits/channels and temperature sensors the spacecraft needs to read from the payload?

Government Response: Per [GLIMR‑REQ‑76] Survival Heaters Power, the payload requires at least 250 W of survival‑heater power. Each survival‑heater circuit is controlled locally by its own thermostatic switch, so the spacecraft does not need to actively command or control these heater circuits.

[GLIMR‑REQ‑87] Survival Heater Temperature Sensors Interface requires that the spacecraft provide an interface for the payload’s survival‑heater temperature sensors. The payload includes 18 temperature sensors total, of which 3 are required to be monitored prior to enabling payload operational power.

8. Industry Question: There is no mention of gimbal radiators or their heat path. Does the spacecraft need to accommodate the Sensor’s gimbals in any way? Where are its radiators, what are their temperature limits, and what dissipation is expected for them?

Government Response: The spacecraft does not need to provide any special accommodation for the Sensor’s gimbals. The thermal path for the gimbal‑mounted hardware is fully captured within the payload’s own radiator system and will be validated through payload‑level thermal testing. The gimbal’s associated temperature limits and expected dissipation are therefore intrinsic to the payload’s Sensor Assembly temperature limits [GLIMR-REQ-50, GLIMR-REQ-51] and heat dissipation [GLIMR-REQ-45] requirements. The offeror does not need to supply special accommodation for the payload’s gimbal as it is thermally isolated from the Spacecraft interface.

9. Industry Comment: Can you provide more details on the requirement [GLIMR-REQ-

21]? Is a detailed STOP analysis needed to verify this requirement? Is there a temperate stability value over a duration on a component for this requirement?

Government Response: Requirement [GLIMR‑REQ‑21] contributes to the overall

Payload geolocation uncertainty allocation. The requirement is verified by analysis, and the Government does not prescribe a specific analysis methodology. Offerors may determine the level of fidelity—such as whether a detailed STOP analysis or similar thermal‑optical‑structural modeling is necessary—based on their design approach and engineering judgment.

The components that drive this requirement are the hyperspectral and landmark imagers.

However, this uncertainty allocation was derived from utilizing the Sensor Assembly frame of reference to limit analyses from offeror to fulfill this requirement. The requirement specifies the required stability of the Sensor Assembly is over a 1-hour duration during GLIMR Payload imaging operations.

10. Industry Question: [GLIMR-REQ-100] states the molecular contamination must be

<150A from payload delivery to on-orbit gimbal deployment.

a. For reference, standard launch vehicles estimate ~1% particulate contamination and ~150 Å molecular contamination deposition during launch.

b. This means all external surfaces with view to the sensor assembly must be perfectly (impossible) clean. Can NASA confirm this is the case and if there’s any flexibility in this requirement?

Government Response: The molecular contamination limit in [GLIMR‑REQ‑100] remains the requirement; however, the Government is willing to consider changing the requirement via the final RFP (or an amendment thereto).

During one-on-one discussions, the Government confirmed that the current cleanliness requirements are challenging. This requirement is from an overall contamination control from the overall mission and levy for ATS at that time.

11. Industry Question: Is there a class of cleanliness or particle size we are protecting against? The requirement is likely impossible for the launch vehicle as far as the cleanliness requirement.

Government Response: [GLIMR-REQ-103] defines the cleanliness class required for the GLIMR payload, class 100,000. [GLIMR-REQ-96] defines the payload locations particulate limitation and their contamination type and level. This requirement identifies the contamination particle size, ~500 angstroms or larger.

12. Industry Question: [GLIMR-REQ-102] states particulate deposition onto the payload must be <1% THROUGH mission (EOL). Can NASA confirm whether there is any flexibility in this requirement?

Government Response: The ≤1% particulate‑deposition limit in [GLIMR‑REQ‑102] is derived from the overall contamination‑control budget required to meet the payload’s end‑of‑life performance. Currently, the Government has not identified flexibility in the requirement itself. If the Government determines it necessary, the Government will incorporate the changed limit via the final RFP or an amendment thereto.

13. Industry Question Can NASA clarify what they’re expecting the bus voltage to be?

Voltage of 32V +/-2V is referenced in the document, as is more normal bus voltage numbers in the 26-27V range.

Government Response: [GLIMR-REQ-77] GLIMR Payload Operational Voltage

Supply states a 32V +/-2V is the expected bus supply voltage. The lowest level expected is 30VDC. The Government cannot accept 26-27V range.

14. Industry Question: Extremely slow voltage turn-on ramp of 2V/s is also requested

(about 500x slower than what spacecraft would normally accommodate) when going from 0-20V). Is this a hard requirement or is there any flexibility?

Government Response: [GLIMR-REQ-81] Peak Inrush Current states “The GLIMR

Spacecraft shall accommodate a peak inrush current at initial application of GLIMR

Payload power with the characteristics specified in Table 4-30 and Figure 4-19.” There is a note that describes it was based on a 27V bus voltage that should not exceed 2V/s up to

20 V and 2V/ms for voltages above 20V. The note is not the requirement; it’s descriptive that only applies to the Table 4-30 and Figure 4-19 information. Furthermore, the bus voltage of 27V is a typo and the correct bus voltage should be 30V and will be corrected in the requirements document released with the final RFP.

15. Industry Question: Does NASA have any resources that can be leveraged for this mission such as smaller NSN dishes?

Government Response: No, the Government is not considering utilizing their ground station resources for this mission.

16. Industry Question: Is this a hard daily downlink requirement? If NASA is willing to reduce to half the amount of downlink per day, this would require a much smaller aperture which is more readily procurable on a rental basis.

Government Response: [GLIMR-REQ-184] Maximum Data Volume states “The

GLIMR Spacecraft shall be capable of transmitting a minimum of 3.75Tb/day.” Based on a full operational 15 hr of daylight. The payload does not have on board storage and thus science data is transferred to the Spacecraft in real time. Offerors could provide onboard storage to utilize within the overall time of transmittal of payload science data. The government is not anticipating real time data downlink for the science data.

17. Industry Question: What availability is required? I.e. if there’s a rainstorm or equipment failure at the ground station, how long can the mission tolerate that?

Government Response: [GLIMR-REQ-143] Data Delivery states “The GLIMR

Spacecraft shall limit GLIMR Payload health and status and science data telemetry loss to 5% of the available measurement opportunities over each calendar month interval”.

Furthermore, the Government is not anticipating a fully operational redundant system for this mission.

18. Industry Question: Can the Government share a CAD for the payload? Specifically, the

OML for the cylinder part of the telescope, where the radiator is, and the bolted interface.

Government Response: The Government is currently working on supplying industry with an appropriate reduced-order structural model. It is anticipated to be supplied by the

Final RFP.

19. Industry Question: Does the GLIMR Payload have an orientation requirement when on launch vehicle.

Government Response: No, the GLIMR Payload does not have an orientation requirement when on launch vehicle and launch. However, Figure 411 (exhibit C, ATSRD) identifies the GLIMR Payload’s subassembly local coordinate systems used for structural analysis. The offerors shall transpose the GLIMR Payload’s subassemblies local coordinate systems to the launch vehicle coordinate system to ensure fulfillment of jitter/vibration requirements [GLIMR-REQ-27 through GLIMR-REQ-38].

20. Industry Question: It is assumed that the preferred launch timeline is in 2028, is there any flexibility with this date?

Government Response: Yes, there is flexibility as there is no official timeline for launch. Launch date is expected to be included in the offeror’s proposed solution and set to achieve mission outcomes and reducing the time to science.

21. Industry Question: The ATS phase chart presented in the pre-solicitation states 12 months of on-orbit operations; however, the Period of Performance section states the base period to be approximately 3 years. Can you clarify the period of performance?

Government Response: The period of performance is the Government’s best estimate for the base period. Offerors are expected to propose their own timeline. The base period will include Integration, Launch, In-Orbit Checkout and 12 months of On-Orbit

Operations.

22. Industry Question: Does the Government intend for the oral presentations to occur prior to the RFP closing date?

Government Response: The Oral Presentations will be scheduled within 3 days after the RFP closes, which is estimated to occur in Sep/Oct depending on RFP release date.

23. Industry Question: Does the Government have a preference to have ATS requirements bundled or is it okay to break them out and propose separately? (i.e. Spacecraft, launch, ground ops)

Government Response: The Government requires an all-inclusive solution.

24. Industry Question: Can the Government speak to the change in sensor assembly environmental requirements since the trade studies occurred?

Government Response: Environmental requirements were updated to proto-flight levels that the payload will be tested to. Original requirements were to acceptance level.