Spacecraft Solar Array Deployment Analysis: A Probabilistic Approach

The mission objective of the TRW satellite requires four solar arrays be deployed simultaneously following separation from the inertial upper stage (IUS) booster. Due to the mechanical system's tolerances, the mass properties control procedure, and in-orbit temperature variation, as well as the potential for satellite tumbling, the possibility of sequential latch-up of flexible solar arrays becomes realistic. To determine the influence of sequential solar array latching on the deployment loads is, therefore, of great practical importance. Although the problem should be treated as a nonstationary stochastic process, the difficulty in obtaining an exact solution renders the process unsuitable. In response, this paper presents a Monte Carlo method for approximating a solution to such a problem.