Design and development of active fluid-ring based attitude control subsystem for satellites

姿态稳定性对于任何空间使命的成功完成都是相当重要的。在过去的五十年中，已经开发了几种卫星姿态确定和稳定的方法。拟议的项目将探讨一种新的姿态控制方法的可行性，使用流体环的金字塔安排。这种姿态控制系统具有体积小、重量轻、成本低、控制力矩大等优点。这些流体环具有用于姿态确定和热控制的潜力。将开发两个数学模型来研究装有拟议系统的卫星的动力学：第一个模型将假设流体环是刚性的，而第二个模型将考虑流体环的结构灵活性。将开发使用所提出的流体环系统的姿态控制、姿态确定和热控制算法。这一概念将通过实验加以验证。如果模拟和实验结果令人鼓舞，将建立一个原型。

Attitude stability is of considerable importance for successful completion of any space mission. Several methods of attitude determination and stabilization of satellites have been developed over the last five decades. The proposed project will explore the feasibility of a novel attitude control method using fluid rings in a pyramid arrangement. Such an attitude control system appears to have certain advantages such as relatively large control torque for its size, light weight and low cost. These fluid rings have the potential to be used for attitude determination and thermal control as well. Two mathematical models will be developed to study the dynamics of the satellite fitted with the proposed system: the first one will assume the fluid rings to be rigid, while the second one will consider the structural flexibility of the fluid rings. Algorithms for attitude control, attitude determination and thermal control using the proposed fluid-ring system will be developed. The concept will be validated by conducting experiments. If the simulation and experimental results are encouraging, a prototype will be built.