ON THE USE OF FLEXIBLE STRINGS IN GRAVITY-GRADIENT STABILIZATION SYSTEMS.
Abstract
A related family of three gravity-gradient-stabilized synchronous equatorial satellites is analyzed considering small-angle attitude dynamics in the orbital plane. A characteristic feature is the use of long thin perfectly flexible strings to achieve the desired mass distribution, which eliminates the solar radiation pressure and heating effects inherent in conventional rigid-boom designs. Damping is achieved by articulated hinges and magnetically-anchored viscous fluid dampers. The designs are optimized using a numerical gradient-search technique and considering the time to damp to half amplitude of the least-damped mode as the performance index. The pointing performance is found to be relatively insensitive to parameter variations. Optimized results are presented for a series of constrained satellite configurations. (Author)
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Jun 01, 1969
- Accession Number
- AD0690495
Entities
People
- Shivam Garg
Organizations
- University of Toronto