NASA's ACS3 mission aims to be the first Earth-bound solar sail to execute calibration steering laws for in-orbit estimation of solar-sail acceleration parameters. To maximise the mission's scientific return, this study identifies the physical effects to include in the dynamical model, the solar-sail acceleration parameters observable from flight data, and the uncertainties to consider during the orbit determination process. The sensitivity of the solar-sail dynamics to perturbations, model uncertainties, and sail-attitude errors is investigated by 1) comparing a reference orbit with modified orbits, each altered in a single dynamical aspect, and 2) evaluating the accuracy of modified models in reconstructing the reference orbit through iterative initial state adjustments. For the one-sigma 10-meter observation noise level of the ACS3 mission and a seven-day arc, results indicate that higher-order lunar perturbations, planetary third-body effects, and relativistic corrections can be omitted from the dynamical model. Additionally, the geopotential expansion may be limited to degree and order 32. In contrast, the dynamics should include the effects of solid Earth tides, account for the instantaneous Sun-sailcraft distance in the solar radiation pressure model, and assume imperfect reflection from the sail surface in the solar and planetary radiation pressure models. Furthermore, the analysis reveals varying levels of observability for the sail optical coefficients, with frontside reflectivity and specularity showing the strongest influence on the solar-sail dynamics. Finally, systematic attitude errors and uncertainties in atmospheric density and accommodation coefficients are the most challenging factors to absorb through initial state adjustment, potentially complicating the estimation of solar-sail acceleration parameters.

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NASA’s ACS3 mission will be the first Earth-bound solar-sail mission to fly so-called calibration steering laws. These steering laws are designed to expose the sailcraft to a variety of dynamical conditions to isolate the effects of different parameters on the dynamics, thereby facilitating the estimation of these parameters. This paper presents the set of candidate calibration steering laws of ACS3, highlighting their operational challenges and impact on the estimation of the sail’s reflectivity and specularity. The results show that, for a conservative GPS position accuracy of 10 m, accurate estimation of the reflectivity and specularity with uncertainties in the order of 10−4 − 10−3 can be achieved by flying any of the proposed calibration laws. However, ACS3’s calibration steering laws were also found to introduce operational challenges that may hinder their implementation for extended periods of time. In particular, the decreased power generation capability of solar arrays was found to be the most severe operational challenge for two out of the five ACS3’s calibration laws analysed. @en