CCSDS/ECSS Telemetry and Telecommand EGSE

The CCSDS / ECSS Telemetry and Telecommand EGSE (Electrical Ground Support Equipment) provides the necessary means for communicating with the on-board space segment. It has been designed to support satellite integration and test activities, on-board space segment development, ground segment applications, etc.

The EGSE communicates directly with the on-board telemetry encoder and telecommand decoder devices, TM/TC boards and units, bypassing the transponder. The EGSE is ideally suited for the verification of FPGA designs and validation of ASIC devices, as well as during integration of complete TM/TC boards or communication subsystems.

The TM/TC EGSE comprises two parts: a generic hardware implementing the lower CCSDS / ECSS protocol levels; and advanced software implementing the higher CCSDS / ECSS protocol levels. The TM/TC EGSE is fully compliant with the latest CCSDS recommendations and ECSS standards. 

Hardware 

The TM/TC EGSE hardware establishes the link between the on-board flight segment and the ground segment software. The EGSE features standardized RS422 interfaces supporting up to 10 MBPS transfers on the downlink and up to 1 MBPS on the uplink. The EGSE hardware communicates with the ground segment software through a 10/100/1000 Mbit/s Ethernet interfaces via TCP/IP.

The TM/TC EGSE hardware is based on our GRTMRX and GRTCTX IP cores.  

Telecommand transmitter capabilities:

  • Frame Error Control Field (FECF)
  • Pseudo-Randomizer (PSR)
  • Bit Transition Generator (BTG)
  • Communications Link Transmission Unit (CLTU)
  • Start Sequence insertion
  • Bose-Chaudhuri-Hocquenghem (BCH)
  • Tail Sequence insertion
  • Physical Layer Operations Procedures (PLOP-1, PLOP-2)
  • Non-Return-to-Zero Mark/Level (NRZ-M/L)

Telemetry receiver capabilities:

  • Operation Control Field (OCF) extraction
  • Frame Error Control Field (FECF) calculation
  • Pseudo-De-Randomizer (PSR)
  • Attached Sync Marker search (ASM) 
  • Non-Return-to-Zero Mark/Level (NRZ-M/L)
  • Convolutional Quick-Look Decoder
  • Split-Phase Level de-modulator (SP-L)
  • Sub-Carrier de-modulator (auto-detection)

The EGSE hardware can efficiently communicate with the library of CCSDS/ECSS routines described below. 

  

 

TM/TC EGSE front panel

 

 

TM/TC EGSE back panel

 

 CCSDS/ECSS Software Library

The TM/TC EGSE hardware is delivered with the CCSDS/ECSS library, which provides basic routines for generating uplink commands and checking downlink data. It is delivered in source code, together with example applications operating on ASCII files. The library currently does not include support for the SpaceWire, CAN interface, and PacketWire interfaces.
Note that the RAMSES (Rocket and Multi-Satellite EMCS Software) software has been discontinued.

 

 CCSDS/ ECSS library capabilities:

  • TC Space Packet, Segment and Transfer
  • Frame generators
  • TC Pseudo-Randomizer and CLTU generator
  • (Start Sequence, BCH coding, Tail Sequence)
  • TM / AOS Transfer Frame print out
  • TM / AOS Transfer Frame / Idle Frame check
  • OCF/CLCW print out and FECF/CFC check
  • First Header Pointer (FHP) check
  • Space Packet protocol check
  • Pseudo De-Randomizer
  • Reed-Solomon (E=16/E=8) check

 Documentation

TM/TC EGSE Product Sheet