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Principle and experimental research on vibration reduction of flexible solar array using reaction flywheel

Bifa Chen (Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Fudan University, Shanghai, China)
Meiyan Zhang (Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Fudan University, Shanghai, China)
Guo-an Tang (Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics (Mechanics and Engineering Science), Fudan University, Shanghai, China)

Aircraft Engineering and Aerospace Technology

ISSN: 0002-2667

Article publication date: 17 October 2018

Issue publication date: 20 November 2018

295

Abstract

Purpose

The rest-to-rest movements for a spacecraft, such as attitude adjustment and orbital manoeuver, are likely to excite residual vibration of flexible appendages, which may affect the attitude accuracy and even result in severe structural damage. The purpose of this paper is to present an approach to attenuating the vibration of flexible solar array by using reaction flywheel.

Design/methodology/approach

The reaction flywheel installed on solar array served as an actuator to provide reaction torque to a structure according to a designed feedback control law. This torque can be considered as an artificial damping. Experiment on a scale model of the solar array is first performed to verify the effectiveness of this method. Numerical simulation on finite element model of a full-scale solar array is subsequently carried out to confirm the validity of this method for practical engineering application.

Findings

The vibration suppression effect on the structure using a reaction flywheel is deduced by theoretical analysis. Results from both experiment and numerical simulation reveal that the efficiency of vibration attenuation is promoted.

Research limitations/implications

Improvements on control law are left for further study. Additionally, only the first-order bending vibration of the flexible solar array is attenuated, and further study is required for other types of vibration suppression.

Practical implications

An effective method is proposed for spacecraft designers to actively suppress the vibration of the flexible solar array.

Originality/value

A novel active vibration reduction scheme is proposed using a reaction flywheel to suppress vibration of the flexible solar array. This paper fulfils a source of theoretical analysis and experimental studies for vibration reduction measure design and provides practical help for the spacecraft designers.

Keywords

Citation

Chen, B., Zhang, M. and Tang, G.-a. (2018), "Principle and experimental research on vibration reduction of flexible solar array using reaction flywheel", Aircraft Engineering and Aerospace Technology, Vol. 90 No. 8, pp. 1282-1287. https://doi.org/10.1108/AEAT-11-2017-0239

Publisher

:

Emerald Publishing Limited

Copyright © 2018, Emerald Publishing Limited

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