Deployment and control of flexible solar array system considering joint friction

Abstract

It is well known that the traditional modeling theories adopt the Cartesian coordinates to establish the dynamic equation of solar array system. The order of this equation is often very high, which is inconvenient for controller design. The Cartesian coordinates are difficult to be measured in practice. In this paper, the joint coordinates are used as generalized variables to establish the dynamic equation of the solar array system. The single direction recursive construction method and the Jourdain’s velocity variation principle are used in modeling the system. The order of the established equation is lower, and the joint coordinates are easily measured in practice. Besides the dynamics modeling, joint friction and control design are extensively studied in this paper too. A three-dimensional revolute joint model is introduced, and the contribution of joint friction to the dynamic equation of the system is deduced. A fuzzy PD controller is designed to eliminate the drift of spacecraft caused by the deployment of solar array. In the end of this paper, numerical simulations are carried out to analyze the deployment dynamics and control effect of the solar array system with friction.