The sensors subsystem is integrated into an electronic card that houses the sensors required to monitor the physical displacement of SATEDU. The included sensors are: a three axis accelerometer, a three axis gyroscope array and an electronic compass. Information from those sensors is used to display SATEDU position at the ground station PC in real time. In addition, the GSS contains software that allows the 3D virtual visualization and real time follow on of movements experimented by SATEDU. This tool is invaluable for the user to friendly understand the principles of satellite navigation as well as satellite operations. This electronic page contains several videos that show in detail this visualization mode captured in our installations at UNAM.

SATEDU also includes two small wireless communications cards operating one through serial port and the other through a USB port. The first one is connected in tandem to SATEDU subsystems, while the second one is connected to the PC that behaves as the Ground Station. The two of them were specially designed and fabricated for the project at UNAM. Every communications card contains the Texas Instruments RF chip CC2500 connected to a PIC microcontroller which performs programming sequences to operate the RF channel.
The intelligent communications cards integrate a 18F2321 PIC microcontroller that interacts with the flight computer on one side, while on the other allows the programming of RF chip functions. For this purpose, the SATEDU communications card contains microswitchs to enable the selection of 1 into 253 different communications bands. This operation facility permits to employ up to 253 independent SATEDU models in just one single classroom or laboratory without experiencing interference problems between each other. This feature makes SATEDU very attractive to be employed in friendly hands-on Engineering training courses.