Rigid-flexible coupling multibody model for the tethered satellite system based on recursive dynamics algorithm

Abstract

A multibody dynamics model of hinged flexible rods was established for the spatial tethered satellite system( TSS) based on the recursive dynamics algorithm. The system was consisted of two rigid endsatellites and a flexible tether connecting them. In the model,the tether was discretized into a series of flexible rods connected by spherical hinges and the non-uniform longitude deformations of the rods were considered,whereas the bending and torsion of the tether were simulated by the motion of the spherical hinges. Then,the equation of motion of the rigid-flexible coupling multibody model was derived based on the recursive dynamics algorithm. The simulation results prove the efficiency of the proposed model in simulation spatial motion of the TSS,including tether vibrations and oscillations in different directions. The introduction of the recursive dynamics algorithm effectively decreases the dimension of the discretized model and therefore reduces the computational efforts sharply.