Research of solar simulator irradiance non-uniformity measurement

The irradiance non-uniformity on test plane of a large area pulsed solar simulator is critical for space solar array electrical characteristic measurement, because it is one of the main error souse of the measurement. Presently, the most commonly used irradiance non-uniformity measurement methods are “mechanical scanning”, “optical tracing”, and “reference correction”, etc., but they can not meet the requirement of measuring the non-uniformity of pulse simulator. In order to solve this problem, a measurement system based on the “shutter method” is developed, which will be able to accomplish an irradiance non-uniformity measurement by only one flush. Firstly, the worldwide commonly used non-uniformity measurement methods and measurement systems are investigated, and a measurement system based on the “shutter” method is designed and developed. Then the natural sun light in clear sky is proved can be used as a calibration light source to calibrate our measurement system, and the uncertainty of the measurement results are evaluated. Afterwards, the irradiation non-uniformity of the calibration light source is tested with the system we developed and the standard ampere meters respectively, the results are consistent. Finally, field measurements of the irradiation non-uniformity of a pulsed solar simulator are conduced with the system we developed.