Reference trajectory analysis and trajectory control by bank angle for re-entry vehicle

Abstract

The re-entry problem consists of guidance design and trajectory control. This paper summarizes the detailed relationships between the velocity, drag acceleration and altitude in determining reference trajectories. The computational issues are also addressed, and the performance of the proposed simple nonlinear control of a bank angle for the longitudinal/lateral trajectory is demonstrated. In particular, the fixed bank angle methods that can reduce the drag acceleration errors at low-speeds are proposed. The importance of bank reversals with respect to the azimuth errors is also elucidated.