Novel Pointing and Stabilizing Manipulator for Optical Space Payloads

Abstract

Considering that the Line-Of-Sight (LOS) of a small optical payload is mainly connected with the angular motions while insensitive to linear motion, a novel pointing and stabilizing manipulator was proposed for small payloads on a large spacecraft. By integrating fine and coarse actuators in parallel, the proposed manipulator could isolate spacecraft vibration and independently adjust the LOS on a large scale at the same time. On this basis, the study revealed the key kinematic and dynamic characteristics and then designed an operation scheme, including the large-scale angular motion algorithm and the active isolation algorithm. Finally, the proposed pointing solution was comprehensively verified through simulation.

Keywords

• pointing mechanism
• fine and coarse integration
• active isolation
• parallel configuration