A thrust maneuver system for steerable vehicles comprising a plurality of thrusters of varying impulsive force, some of which provide a base force, and others varying multiples of the base force. The forces may be used additively or subtractively to obtain a desired force for any given maneuver.

Thrust maneuver system

An active nutation control system for a space vehicle spinning about a geometric axis has thrusters for creating an external torque about an axis transverse to the first. The amplitude of the nutation and its phase in relation with the spinning movement are detected. A control arrangement receives signals from the nutation detectors, computes the changes in the angular direction of the angular momentum of the vehicle caused by thruster activation and energizes the thrusters when contemporaneously the amplitude of the nutation movement is greater than a predetermined threshold, the phase corresponds to maximum efficiency of said thrusters in reducing nutation momentum of the vehicle or at least does not increase it.

Active nutation control system for space vehicle

A method and apparatus that afford a user accelerated access to operation of a balancing personal transporter The method includes first initializing a single-axis stabilizer, and, while initializing a 3-axis stabilizer, alerting the rider that the transporter is ready for use, allowing operation of the transporter, and then completing initialization of the 3-axis stabilizer, and employing the 3-axis stabilizer for control of the balancing personal transporter Apparatus includes single axis and 3-axis stabilizer and means to alert the user of the personal transporter

Accelerated startup for a balancing personal vehicle

A pair of reaction motors or thrusters connected to spin-stabilized spacecraft are used to reorient spacecraft attitude without affecting spacecraft velocity. The spacecraft reaction motors are arranged to produce a couple in response to an attitude reference signal without applying a spacecraft velocity changing force to the spin-stabilized spacecraft.

Orientation system for a spin stabilized spacecraft

MAGNETICALLY TORQUED NUTATION DAMPING Abstract A system for actively damping nutation of an earth orbiting spacecraft and/or aligning the pitch axis of a momentum bias spacecraft with some external reference includes a magnetic torquing means, which is energized with currents of appropriate polarity and magnitude to effect the necessary torque to reduce nutation by producing in the roll/yaw axis of the spacecraft a magnetic dipole for reaction with the earth's magnetic field. A roll sensor produces signals proportional to and representing the direction of the attitude error of the satellite with respect to a desired attitude. A control signal is generated a predetermined time period after the roll error exceeds a predetermined threshold. The predetermined time period is a fraction x of the nutation period tn of the satellite or x + n(tn) where n is an integer.

Magnetically torqued nutation damping

A system for controlling the attitude of a space vehicle which undergoes both spinning and coning motion wherein first and second gating means are serially coupled to deliver operating power to a thrust producing device mounted on the vehicle to generate a torque for reorienting the vehicle only when both gate means are simultaneously energized. The first gate means is energized by a first sensing device responsive to the spin orientation of the vehicle relative to the desired attitude in order to pass power for actuating the thrust producing device to produce at an appropriate point in the spin orbit an incremental torque tending to reorient the spin axis toward alignment with the desired heading. The second gate means is energized by a second sensing means responsive to the orientation of the vehicle in its coning orbit relative to the desired attitude in order to deliver the power pulses passed by the first gating means to actuate the thrust producing device only during predetermined portions of each coning orbit where the vehicle heading is closest to the desired heading.

Space vehicle attitude control

A cross-rate axis sensor is provided for use with a moving vehicle, such as an elongated space vehicle, which undergoes both spinning and coning motion. The sensor which may be rotatably mounted about the longitudinal axis of the vehicle continually aligns itself with the instantaneous direction of transverse angular velocity or cross-rate axis of the vehicle due to coning motion, and the angular position of the rotatable sensor relative to the vehicle can be used to phase the torques provided by a thrust-producing nozzle mounted on the vehicle to reduce and eventually eliminate the coning motion. The sensor includes a rotatively driven momentum wheel, the axis of rotation of which continuously follows the cross-rate axis, and a cylindrical member rotatably mounted about an axis parallel to the vehicle axis of the elongation within the vehicle and having a hollow interior within which the momentum wheel is rotatably mounted as a gyroscope element in a balanced single degree of freedom gimbal system.

Andre Lanzaro

Papers

Space vehicle attitude control

Cross-rate axis sensor