Electronic sun incidence avoidance device

Aeronautics and astronautics – Spacecraft – Attitude control

Patent

Rate now

  [ 0.00 ] – not rated yet Voters 0   Comments 0

Details

244158R, 244171, B64G 124

Patent

active

049971468

ABSTRACT:
One-dimensional sun sensing and angle measurement assemblies are deployed with substantially totally overlapping fields of view on a plane of a spacecraft body to protect sensors within a protected angular area of the plane, each of the analog sun sensors generating a signal indicative of incident sun along one axis and the presence of sunlight along an orthogonal axis thereto in the common plane. The sensors together generate an indication of the orientation of the sun relative to a target field of view which is a protected area. In an alternative embodiment, a digital sun sensor assembly is provided consisting of two or more independent digital channels and employing a slit aperture cooperating with a plurality of photocells laid out in a gray coded pattern. The digital device produces digital signals indicating relative position relative to axes in a plane. Such signals can be used during a spacecraft operation to override any other control logic in order to stop satellite motion that may bring the field of view of the protected instrument into an undesired orientation relative to the sun.

REFERENCES:
patent: 3348374 (1967-10-01), Schalkowsky
patent: 3427453 (1969-02-01), Gill et al.
patent: 3439884 (1969-04-01), Slater
patent: 3752993 (1973-08-01), Davidson et al.
patent: 4012018 (1977-03-01), Lorell et al.
patent: 4288051 (1981-09-01), Goschel
patent: 4358076 (1982-11-01), Lange et al.
patent: 4371135 (1983-02-01), Keigler
patent: 4375878 (1983-03-01), Harvey et al.
patent: 4508297 (1985-04-01), Mouilhayrat et al.
patent: 4674715 (1987-06-01), Frisch

LandOfFree

Say what you really think

Search LandOfFree.com for the USA inventors and patents. Rate them and share your experience with other people.

Rating

Electronic sun incidence avoidance device does not yet have a rating. At this time, there are no reviews or comments for this patent.

If you have personal experience with Electronic sun incidence avoidance device, we encourage you to share that experience with our LandOfFree.com community. Your opinion is very important and Electronic sun incidence avoidance device will most certainly appreciate the feedback.

Rate now

     

Profile ID: LFUS-PAI-O-491646

  Search
All data on this website is collected from public sources. Our data reflects the most accurate information available at the time of publication.