Dynamics and control of a spacecraft with a moving, pulsating ball in a spherical cavity

A model with two interacting bodies, for a spacecraft with liquid, has been developed. The spacecraft without liquid is the "tank" and is characterized by its inertial properties and the location and size of a spherical cavity. In the cavity is located the "slug", a sphere of uniform density with a variable radius. At the point of contact...

A reference model for the dynamics of a flexible, spacecraft-based manipulator

The objective of the study is to develop the equations of motion of a single link, flexible manipulator, attached to an orbiting spacecraft. A payload may be attached to the end-effector of the manipulator. Starting point is d'Alembert's principle, with displacements described by hybrid coordinates. The equations of motion for the two-body...

Towards digital computer simulation of the dynamics of flexible spacecraft

Software design for digital computer simulation of the dynamics of flexible spacecraft equipped with actuators and sensors, should take into account two properties of the overall system: (i) s.ampled-data control of the spacecraft leads to discontinuous inputs (forcing functions) in the differential equations of motion, thereby requiring...