Design and simulation of a flexible bending actuator for solar sail attitude control
Publication Date
2021-12Journal Title
Aerospace
ISSN
2226-4310
Publisher
MDPI AG
Volume
8
Issue
12
Language
en
Type
Article
This Version
VoR
Metadata
Show full item recordCitation
Liu, M., Wang, Z., Ikeuchi, D., Fu, J., & Wu, X. (2021). Design and simulation of a flexible bending actuator for solar sail attitude control. Aerospace, 8 (12) https://doi.org/10.3390/aerospace8120372
Abstract
<jats:p>This paper presents the design of a flexible bending actuator using shape memory alloy (SMA) and its integration in attitude control for solar sailing. The SMA actuator has advantages in its power-to-weight ratio and light weight. The bending mechanism and models of the actuator were designed and developed. A neural network based adaptive controller was implemented to control the non-linear nature of the SMA actuator. The actuator control modules were integrated into the solar sail attitude model with a quaternion PD controller that formed a cascade control. The feasibility and performance of the proposed actuator for attitude control were investigated and evaluated, showing that the actuator could generate 1.5 × 10−3 Nm torque which maneuvered a 1600 m2 CubeSat based solar sail by 45° in 14 h. The results demonstrate that the proposed SMA bending actuator can be effectively integrated in attitude control for solar sailing under moderate external disturbances using an appropriate controller design, indicating the potential of a lighter solar sail for future missions.</jats:p>
Keywords
solar sail, attitude control, shape memory alloy, neural network
Identifiers
External DOI: https://doi.org/10.3390/aerospace8120372
This record's URL: https://www.repository.cam.ac.uk/handle/1810/331709
Rights
Licence:
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
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