In-flight attitude estimations and control experiments with Iras based on modern control theory

In-flight attitude estimations and control experiments with Iras based on modern control theory

Terpstra, A.P.
Zwartbol, T.
Slippens, C.P.R.C.

National Aerospace Laboratory NLR

1984-04-19

One of the research activities of the Space Division of the National Aerospace Laboratory NLR is the application of modern estimation and control theory to spacecraft attitude control problems. Algorithms for spacecraft state estimation and attitude control, as well as for inertial-optical attitude determination have been developed previously and tested in extensive computersimulations. The present report describes three in-flight experiments with the Infrared Astronomical Satellite IRAS, during which these algorithms have been loaded from the ground into the IRAS on-board computer and have been tested in-flight. The IRAS satellite was placed into orbit January 26th, 1983 and successfully performed an infrared survey of the entire celestial sphere within 6 months. To this end the three-axis stabilized spacecraft was provided with an on-board digital attitude control system based on PID-control techniques. The estimation and control experiments performed show that the model folio wing control concept can be applied successsfully to manoeuvring spacecraft like IRAS and can be used with any type of closed-loop regulator. The inertial-optical attitude determination experiment demonstrated the feasibility of in-orbit estimation of gyro drift using measurements by an absolute attitude sensor. All experiments are described in detail, in-flight results are presented and their performance is analyzed and compared to the original behaviour. The report concludes with a summary which presents the main conclusions.

infrared astronomy satellite
satellite attitude control
Kalman filters
trajectory control
onboard dataprocessing
airborne/spaceborne computers
computer systems programma
online reprogramming
remote control
position errors
velocity errors
slewing
orbit position estimation

http://resolver.tudelft.nl/uuid:649b28c1-b7af-413a-884a-079aa6c969ea

Nationaal Lucht- en Ruimtevaartlaboratorium

Campus only

NLR-TR 84029 U

Aerospace Engineering Reports

report

(c) 1984 National Aerospace Laboratory NLR