New Open Source CubeSat Design from Exo-Space

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Hi all,

I posted our open source cubesat design on reddit a couple weeks ago and someone suggested that I also post it here.

We have developed a new hardware system for cubesats that uses a slotted connector instead of the PC-104 stack. It’s super easy to work and still conforms to the cubesat standard.

Feel free to use it on your own projects. And if you find it useful or think it needs improvements please let us know! We would love feedback on the design.
https://www.exo-space.com/open-source

The idea is that anyone can download and manufacture this product for themselves for free, however, we also sell it on our website for near cost if you want to go that route as well.

Thanks,
Jeremy

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Hi under what open source hardware license these designs are available?

I tried to find a reference on the license but failed to find one. For example at Libre Space Foundation we usually use the CERN Open Hardware Licence

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We do not have an official open source license. Is that something we need to write, or can we use pre-existing licensing documents?

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hey @jjallam, nice to see you here!

As the word “source” in open-source denotes, there needs to be some source available for the things you are trying to publish (and of course a license). Unfortunately we can see neither of those. @elkos rightfully pointed out the license part, but I want to be a stickler for the source files.

Source files for your step files would be e.g. FreeCAD files and for your gerber it would be e.g. KiCAD files. Where are those available?

Also as a side-note: What kind of structural analysis and modeling have you done for your proposed structure? Thanks!

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You definitely don’t want to write your own license. It will be expensive and no one will trust it since it doesn’t have an established knowledge base. I suggest using the same license Libre Space Foundation / SatNOGs uses, such as CERN. GPLv3+ and/or CC by SA 4.0 international are also good for code and documentation, respectively.

Here’s some more info:

Note, doing a “non-commercial” (NC) license is NOT “open source” and not a good idea.

See also, “Open Source Definition”:

Happy hacking,

-Jeff

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Thank you for the feedback, everyone. I will get the licensing through CERN and repost when that is done. I will also talk to our Structural Engineer and get the FreeCAD and KiCad files on the website. Licensing and files will be contained in a single zip file.

@pierros, there has only been a first order structural analysis done on the design. It was modeled in solid works. We plan to do a much more detail analysis in the future, but currently our structural design team has been busy on another more pressing project.

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May I suggets that you put the source files somewhere where people easily can suggest and discuss improvements? A github account is a common solution.

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