The International Space Station will be equipped with a Canadian-built Mobile Servicing System (MSS). The MSS will be to the Space Station what the Canadarm is to the Shuttle. Much of the Space Station will actually be assembled using the MSS.

To control this robotic system, a Robotic Workstation (RWS), featuring a Display and Control Panel, hand controllers, video monitors and computers was designed and built to provide a highly reliable, seamless interface between man and machine. The RWS was developed by MDA under contract to NASA.

This firm fixed price contract was won by MDA 1994. A total of 6 Robotic Workstations have been built (3 Functional Equivalent Units, 2 Flight Units and 1 qualification model).  The flight RWS features:

• 1 Control Electronics Unit
• 1 Display and Control Panel
• 1 Rotational and 1 Translational Handcontroller
• 3 LCD Video Monitors
• Support Structure 
• Harness Assemblies
• Firmware, Host Software and Video Graphic Software

The 2 Flight units will be installed on the Space Station and the 3 Functional Equivalent Units, manufactured with non-flight parts and quality standards, will be used on the ground for software integration and astronaut training purposes.

Technical Details

The heart of the RWS system is the RWS Control Electronics Unit. This space computer features 2 Central Processing Unit (CPU) cards, 2 - 1553 interface cards, 3 video cards, 1 analog / digital card and an Electronic Power Conditioner. The CPU cards are based on MDA's Radiation Hardened 80386 DX microprocessor and a 80387 co-processor. 

All of the electronic cards are interconnected by an Industry Standard Architecture (ISA) bus, with the exception of the video cards, which are connected, by a VESA Local bus.

The software running in the control electronics unit comprises the Workstation Host Software, the Video Graphics Software and the Operations Control Software. 

The Workstation Host Software is the operating system and data bus interface.  The Video Graphics Software, also provided by MDA, controls the video displayed to the astronaut on the three monitors.  This VGS also provides system parameters overlaid on the video picture.  The Operations Control Software, developed by MDA in Richmond, provides the control and coordination for all of the MSS elements - the Space Station Remote Manipulator System, the Mobile Base System and the Special Purpose Dexterous Manipulator.

The RWS flight units were designed to be mounted in a standard USL rack and installed in the U.S. Lab Module on the Space Station. In anticipation of the eventual installation in the Space Station cupola, one RWS unit will be moved into the Cupola. This will enable the astronauts controlling the MSS to augment the video views provided by the RWS with views of the Space Station through the Cupola windows. 

The RWS was launched March 8th on STS-102 Station flight 5A.1.