TITLE:
Attitude Control of a Flexible Satellite by Using Robust Control Design Methods
AUTHORS:
Reza Mohsenipour, Hossein Nemati, Mehrzad Nasirian, Abdolreza Kashani Nia
KEYWORDS:
Attitude Control of Satellite; Robust Control; Flexible Satellite; Uncertainty
JOURNAL NAME:
Intelligent Control and Automation,
Vol.4 No.3,
August
9,
2013
ABSTRACT: The increase of satellite’s dimensions has caused flexibility and formation of uncertainty in their model. This is because of space missions being more complex and using light moving structures in satellites. Satellites are also encountered with various circumferential disturbance torques. This uncertainty in model and disturbance torques will cause undesirable performance of satellites’ attitude control system. So, for attitude control of these satellites, those methods should be used which are robust to uncertainty of the plant’s model and can reject the effects of disturbances and the measurement noise. One of these methods is the robust control design method. But, because of pole’s place of these satellite’s dynamics equations, the designing procedure of robust control will face difficulties. In this paper, by using an internal feedback as a novel idea, the satellite’s dynamics equations are changed in such a way that the poles will be placed in proper locations. Then, for these new equations, by regarding the effects of flexibility as uncertainty and considering the uncertainty in inertia matrix of satellite, an H∞ controller has been designed and for better performance, a μ-controller has been improved. Afterwards, these two controllers are analyzed and compared for the original dynamic equations, not for the modified ones. Also, for comparison, a classic controller has been also designed for the original plant and eventually all these three controllers are compared with each other.