Spacecraft attitude control using electrical power subsystem

Details Spacecraft attitude control using electrical power subsystem Spacecraft attitude control using electrical power subsystem

1997-04-01

2000-07-18

Barefoot, Galen L.

Aeronautics and astronautics

Spacecraft

Attitude control

B64G 132

Patent

active

060895098

ABSTRACT:
A spacecraft (10) body (20) located in an external magnetic field (12) has a substantially unbalanced electrical power bus (18) that generates a composite local magnetic field The electrical power bus (18) substantially surrounds an external surface (22) of the spacecraft (10). Current in the electrical power bus (18) is solar panel (14and 16) and/or battery (34) generated and can flow in different directions through different current paths. Electrical loads (58) are coupled to power converters (56) and current path switches (54) to couple the power converters (56) to the various current paths. A controller (28) takes sensor data (82), determines a required attitude adjustment torque (84), translates that adjustment torque into a composite magnetic field (86), determines an unbalanced bus current profile (88) to generate that composite magnetic field, selects a current source (90) and regulates current path switches (92) to achieve a desired attitude adjustment torque for the spacecraft (10).

REFERENCES:
patent: 3390848 (1968-07-01), Crocker, II
patent: 3838834 (1974-10-01), Michaelis
patent: 5158250 (1992-10-01), Reboux
patent: 5413293 (1995-05-01), Gomberg et al.
patent: 5540405 (1996-07-01), Bender et al.
patent: 5787368 (1998-07-01), Gamble et al.

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