MicroCarb
Shape built from published dimensions and pictures; details simplified.
Turn it in 3D
Open the 3D viewer (www.spaceradar.ai).
The viewer loads when you ask: about 700 kB the first time (three.js and the model), much less after.
Pictures 4
Three-quarter view
From the side
From behind
From above
About this model
MicroCarb is one of the 203 3D models Space Radar made itself: a satellite, built in code from published dimensions and photographs, with no image-to-3D generator and no one else’s mesh.
Shape built from published dimensions and pictures; details simplified. It has 18,714 triangles in a 159 kB glTF file, and is 1.0 m across at full scale.
On Space Radar’s live map it is drawn for the object with NORAD catalogue number 64899, where its published orbit puts it now. Open it on the map.
Dimensions and their sources
| Measure | Value |
|---|---|
| Body x | 0.8 m |
| Body z | 0.6 m |
| Stack height | 1 m |
| Payload | 0.6 × 0.8 × 0.4 m |
| Mass | 175 kg |
| Array panels | 2 |
| Array panel | 0.85 × 0.6 m |
eoPortal, 'MicroCarb', eoportal.org/satellite-missions/microcarb, OPENED 2026-11-05: 'The size of the satellite is 600 x 800 x 1000 mm'; 'The MicroCarb payload has a mass of 63 kg, a size of 600 x 800 x 400 mm'; 'a Myriade Evolutions minisatellite platform'; 'CNES intends to use for MicroCarb a solar array in storage that fits the mission needs' (NO array size). CNES, cnes.fr/en/news/microcarb-innovative-mission-survey-co2-orbit, OPENED 2026-11-05. PAGES DISAGREE on the mass: eoPortal says about 190 kg, 175 kg and about 160 kg in three places, CNES 180 kg; the mass is not in the mesh. ESTIMATED: THE ARRAY (two panels of 0.85 m by 0.6 m, a 0.07 m hinge gap, a 0.26 m by 0.13 m notch on the outer panel), scaled from the stowed plate in CNES's figure 12, the aspect of the panels in CNES's artwork and the 200 W the page states; the three artworks do not agree on the notch's side or the array's height. The platform's 0.8 m by 0.6 m footprint and its 0.56 m depth (1.0 m less the payload's 0.4 m and the ring's 0.04 m); the PAS610 ring's 0.58 m; the oval baffle (mouth 0.52 m by 0.34 m, held within the payload's height); every small part.
How it was made
Built in code from published dimensions and photographs, with no image-to-3D generator and no one else’s mesh. 3D model: built by Space Radar from the dimensions eoPortal and CNES publish for MicroCarb and from CNES's and Airbus DS's drawings, artwork and photographs of it (looked at, not used).
The full record
built by this project in code (the private tool model-from-images: assemble.py, from a yaml of primitives written by a script, object `microcarb`), from the cited numbers and the pictures under `references`; no image-to-3D model was used, and no published mesh of the craft (CNES publishes pictures, not a model; NASA's 3D Resources path list, 1 583 paths, read by name on 2026-11-05: none of this craft)
Where the map uses it. NORAD 64899 (MICROCARB, 2025-156A): CNES's small carbon-dioxide satellite on a Myriade Evolutions minisatellite bus, launched on a Vega-C on 26 July 2025. It had no route of its own and was drawn as the generic satellite; public #961. NOT for GOSAT (another craft)
Licence note. None of the pictures is in the file and none was fetched into it. LOOKED AT ONLY: CNES's and Airbus DS's CAD drawings and artist's views on eoPortal (figures 8, 12, 13 and 20 and the header picture, credits CNES and Airbus DS, no licence stated), CNES's photographs and artwork of the craft on cnes.fr (rights reserved), and a photograph on Wikimedia Commons of a scale model at the CNES stand (CC BY-SA 4.0). The shape is this project's, under this repository's licence, built from published numbers (facts). NO LOGO AND NO LETTERING is on the mesh.
References 4
What the shape was compared with. None of these pictures is in the file.
- eoPortal, 'MicroCarb'CNES; Airbus DSnumbers are facts; the page's pictures: no licence stated (credit CNES; Airbus DS)
- eoPortal, 'MicroCarb', figures 12, 13 and 20CNESno licence stated (credit CNES; read 2026-11-05): LOOKED AT ONLY, not reproduced
- eoPortal figure 8 (credit Airbus DS); CNES, 'MicroCarb' news page and mission artworkCNES; Airbus DSno licence stated (CNES, rights reserved; Airbus DS; read 2026-11-05): LOOKED AT ONLY, not reproduced
- Wikimedia Commons, 'MicroCarb.jpg'the photographer named on the Commons file pageCC BY-SA 4.0 (Commons' LicenseShortName, read 2026-11-05): LOOKED AT ONLY, nothing copied
Use it
The model is under the MIT licence: use it, change it and share it, in any project, also a paid one. Keep the credit:
MicroCarb 3D model by Space Radar (spaceradar.ai), MIT LicenseAny glTF 2.0 loader that reads meshopt compression (EXT_meshopt_compression) opens the file: three.js with its MeshoptDecoder, Babylon.js, model-viewer. Tools such as glTF-Transform can write an uncompressed copy.
Or embed the viewer in your page:
<iframe src="https://www.spaceradar.ai/model/?id=microcarb" title="MicroCarb, 3D model by Space Radar" width="600" height="450" loading="lazy" style="border:0;max-width:100%"></iframe>Related models
