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ASSET: a software tool for the evaluation of manoeuvre capabilities of highly agile satellites

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Abstract

The new generation of agile earth observation satellites provides much higher observation capabilities than their non-agile predecessors. From a kinematic point of view, these capabilities result in more complex guidance laws for the spacecraft’s attitude control system. The computation of these guidance laws is driven by a number of factors. For instance, the Earth’s curved shape and its rotation in combination with the possible scan path geometries lead to a highly nonlinear relation between the motion of the satellite and the line-of-sight projection onto Earth. In this paper ASSET (Agile Satellites Scenario Evaluation Tool) is presented. ASSET is a modular MATLAB command line tool developed at Astrium GmbH, Germany, to asses the manoeuvre capabilities of agile satellites carrying time-delayed integration instruments. Each single scenario may consist of one or several ground scans, linked by suitable spacecraft slews. Once the entire scenario is defined, ASSET will analyse whether the kinematic and dynamic constraints of a specific satellite allow this scenario to be performed and will then generate the related guidance profile (angles and angular rates). The satellites’ ground track, the projection of the instruments line-of-sight, and the projection of the instruments field of view onto the earth can be plotted for a visual inspection. ASSET can perform the analysis of scenarios with several different scan modes usually performed by this type of satellite.

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Notes

  1. The problem of time optimal spacecraft reorientation falls into the field of optimal control and has been widely discussed in the literature [9–11]. Today, a proof for a time optimal non-rest to non-rest attitude manoeuvre is still missing. The function used for ASSET represents a higher-order polynomial solution and is considered to be close to the unknown optimal one.

  2. As disturbances are not included in the simulation, the momentum storage capabilities of the actuators are defined by the maximum allowed rotation rate. The example scenario assumes 2°/s maximum allowed rotation rate, which results in required momentum storage capabilities of 17.45 Nms per axis and wheel. A reaction wheel, which can provide such torque is described in [13].

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Technische Universität Berlin, Marchstr. 12-14, 10587, Berlin, Germany

    Merlin F. Barschke

  2. Astrium GmbH, Claude-Dornier-Strasse, 88090, Immenstaad, Germany

    Jens Levenhagen & Domenico Reggio

  3. Cranfield University, Bedfordshire, MK43 0AL, UK

    Peter C. E. Roberts

Authors
  1. Merlin F. Barschke
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  2. Jens Levenhagen
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  3. Domenico Reggio
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  4. Peter C. E. Roberts
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Merlin F. Barschke.

Additional information

This paper is based on a presentation at the German Aerospace Congress, September 10–12, 2012, Berlin, Germany.

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Barschke, M.F., Levenhagen, J., Reggio, D. et al. ASSET: a software tool for the evaluation of manoeuvre capabilities of highly agile satellites. CEAS Space J 6, 37–45 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12567-013-0057-2

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12567-013-0057-2

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