This spacecraft will necessarily be out of service for long periods of time... The spacecraft mechanical design and thermal design contain a few flaws.
It might be more fair to call them design "limitations", since they must have had constraints to what they could design and still get the ride on the side of the conical adapter shown in the photo.
... So it will spin like a pancake...[with] ... long periods [with] the spin axis ... nearly PERPENDICULAR to the sun
vector.
This means that the panels will receive almost no illumination
[most of the time] and the... VERY large radiating surface [will] cool down the inside of the spacecraft to extremely
frigid
temperatures.
Agree completely with your assessment. Lets hope it has practically no spin (that would make it spin in pancake mode) and so maybe it will achieve a gravity gradient posture and may have a better probability of seeing the sun sometimes?
However, the way the long antenna seems to have its own support structure on the side of the colical adapter, then it either had a complicated two-catch release system, or the initial separation was somehow expected to detach the antenna as well. In either case, I see lots of potential for uneven forces and therefore a good liklyhood of a high spin rate...?
Bob, WB4APR