Details of the balloon and launch operations
Launch site:Centre de Lancement de Ballons CLBA, Aire Sur L'Adour, Landes, France
Launch team: CNES
Balloon: Open balloon model 100sf
Serial number: 100SF Nº 229
Flight identification number: -
Campaign: -
Payload weight: 350 kgs
Gondola weight: 153 kgs
Overall weight: -
Description of the payload or experiment
CASOLBA (CAlibration de cellules SOLaires sur vol BAllon)
Responsable institution: CNES (Centre National d'Etudes spatiales - AQ/SE/QM)
Principal Investigator: -
A highly sophisticated gondola specializing in air mass zero (AM0) calibration of solar cells.
Calibrations are performed fliying the gondola on-board stratospheric balloons at high altitudes (>36 km) where the solar spectral irradiance is very close to AM0. The cells calibrated in this way can subsequently be used as standard solar cell in various laboratory tasks for solar cell characterization by sun simulators.
CNES is the only laboratory in Europe carrying out calibration of this type above the atmosphere.
At left is a drawing of the balloon/payload system (click to enlarge).
The CNES calibration flights have flown from Aire sur l'Adour or Gap (in France) facilities since 1975 and recently (2005) also were flown in the ecuatorial region (Northern Brazil). The flights are scheduled between June and September, since the Sun is high in the sky at this time of year so that the sunlight passes through a minimal thickness of the atmosphere before reaching the solar modules.
Performance in flight and data obtained
>> No data available