Add Some Ground Stations

A facility represents a point location on or near the surface of the Earth or any other central body, like a ground station. They can be user-created or loaded from a database.

Do It Yourself

You can use a facility's Position page to place it anywhere on Earth (or on another central body). Here you will use position information for Perth, Australia to place a facility there:

  1. Bring up the Insert STK Objects Dialog by clicking Insert Objects ().

  2. The Insert STK Objects tool makes it easy to insert and configure some of the most commonly used individual objects. The left-hand pane lists commonly used STK objects. When you select an object on the left, all of the methods available for that class of object will be listed on the right.

  3. Select Facility Icon Facility icon from the Scenario Objects.
  4. Select Properties Icon Define Properties from the Select A Method list.
  5. Click Insert...A new facility appears in the Object Browser as 'Facility1'. The Properties window for the facility will appear.
  6. Select the Basic - Position page.
  7. Select Geodetic from the Type list.
  8. Enter -31.803 in the Latitude field.
  9. Enter 115.885 in the Longitude field.
  10. Enter 0.022 as the Altitude for the facility.
  11. Click OK to apply the changes and close the Properties Browser.
  12. Select the Facility in the Object Browser.
  13. Click F2 and rename the facility Perth.

Perth now appears in the southwest corner of Australia.

Use the Facility Database

Instead of doing all the work yourself, you can load one or more of the hundreds of pre-defined facilities in STK's Facility Database. For example, use the database to add the Wallops station on Virginia's eastern shore:

  1. Select Facility Icon Facility icon from the Scenario Objects.
  2. Select Facility Data Base Icon Select from Facility Database from the Select A Method list.
  3. Click Insert... to bring up the Facility Database.
  4. Select the Site Name option. In the text field, enter Wallops.
  5. Click Search. Wallops will appear in the facility search results list below the search controls.
  6. Select Wallops from the list.
  7. Click Insert.
  8. Click Close to close the Facility Database dialog box.

Wallops now appears in the Object Browser, and is displayed in the proper location in the 2D and 3D Graphics windows.

Tip: If you display the Properties Browser for Wallops and select the Description page, you will see that its position data and other information appear in the Long Description field. You can open any object's Properties Browser by double-clicking the object in the Object Browser.