Two degree-of-freedom spacecraft attitude controller

Two degree-of-freedom controller is designed together with its governing equations for a spacecraft pitch attitude control. The attitude controller incorporates the Active Force Control (AFC) technique into the conventional Proportional-Derivative (PD) controller based spacecraft pitch attitude loop. The PD-AFC attitude controller is then employed to enhance the attitude pointing of the Combined Energy and Attitude Control System (CEACS). Numerical treatments are performed to validate the effectiveness of AFC, whereby the CEACS attitude performance is analysed from its accuracy point of view. The results show that the PD-AFC attitude control performance is superiorly better than that of the solely conventional PD type.     

Attitude pointing enhancement for combined energy and attitude control system

This paper extends the previous works that appeared in Acta Astronautica. An approach that incorporates the Active Force Control (AFC) technique into a conventional Proportional-Derivative (PD) controller is proposed for a 50 kg small satellite. Numerical treatments are performed to validate the effectiveness of AFC. The attitude control capability of the combined energy and attitude control system (CEACS) is expected to improve. The result shows an important attitude pointing enhancement for the CEACS attitude control task.