Time Optimal State Feedback Control with Application to a Spacecraft with Cold Gas Propulsion * *This work was supported by NASA SBIR/STTR Phase II grant for the Free-Flying Unmanned Robotic Spacecraft for Asteroid Resource Prospecting and Characterization project under contract NNX15CK07C.

Abstract

Abstract A cold gas propulsion system is well suited to provide the required thrust for a small surveyor spacecraft operated near an asteroid or planetary surface. The cold gas propellant can obtained in-situ from local surface or atmospheric constituents. For small spacecraft, the cold gas system may be limited to only on-off control of the main tank where the generated thrust is directly dependent on the tank pressure. As such the thrust will slowly decrease as the propellant is expended. A state feedback, time optimal, control law is developed for a vehicle with decreasing thrust in translational motion. The success of the control law is shown in simulation.