Design Blueprint: An Orbital Electroforming System for Nickel Reflector Shells and Waveguides: Faraday-Law, Power and Solution-Mass Budgets

Design blueprint derived from the source paper (DOI 10.5281/zenodo.24185006): This paper presents a computed design study, SIMULATED, NOT MEASURED, for thin nickel reflector shells, waveguide sections and precision replication moulds in orbit, using nickel sulfamate electrolyte and soluble nickel anodes. The operating principle is distinct from neighbouring production methods: nickel ions are reduced onto a rotating mandrel from a temperature-controlled sulfamate bath, building a stress-free shell atom by atom at a rate fixed by Faraday's law. The product separates from the mandrel as a finished thin shell whose inner surface reproduces the mandrel finish. There is no melt, no powder and no cutting; the sizing variables are current, cell voltage, bath mass and the water that must be managed in a closed cabin environment. Sizing follows from budgets computed in the accompanying script rather than from analogy with terrestrial equipment. The headline figures are a specific energy of 15.1 megajoules per kilogram of product, an installed electrical power of 1.93 kilowatts, a production rate of 0.46 kilograms per hour, and an annual throughput of 3.64e+03 kilograms over 330 operating days. Rejecting 1.06 kilowatts of waste heat at 325 kelvin requires 1.91 square metres of radiator, a photovoltaic supply requires 4.73 square metres of array, and the installed mass is 581 kilograms. Moving feedstock from a 400 kilometre to an 800 kilometre orbit costs 217 metres per second of velocity change. The study is a computed study with no targeting or weapon application; it concerns civilian production equipment only, and none of its figures is a measurement. Status: DESIGN BLUEPRINT — SIMULATED, NOT MEASURED — NOT BUILT. All numbers are simulated values from the source paper's computation, deposited with this blueprint as compute.py and results.json. AI-use disclosure: Dave, an AI research system, assisted with the computation and drafting under the author's direction; author of record William Alexander Aldred.