Six-Degree-of-Freedom Control With Only Eight Thrusters

  • Magazine Article
  • TBMG-23462
Published December 01, 2015 by Tech Briefs Media Group in United States
Language:
  • English

Typical spacecraft thruster configurations are often unable to provide full six-degree-of-freedom control and may have unwanted interaction between their attitude control and trajectory control functions, have undesirably high instantaneous electrical power demands, and use more thrusters than desirable. These last two potential problems gain increased significance if a spacecraft is required to have especially small size and mass, and have very low cost.