METHOD OF CONTROL OF SPACE TURN OF SPACECRAFT Russian patent published in 1998 - IPC

FIELD: space engineering; effective control of spacecraft attitude. SUBSTANCE: proposed method includes stages of acceleration, free rotation and pulse deceleration of spacecraft; during second stage, deviation of present moment of momentum from rated magnitude at which spacecraft starts free rotation from present to preset final attitude is determined and rotation of space- craft is corrected by means of pulses, thus eliminating above-mentioned deviation. Rated magnitude of moment of momentum is automatically determined by means of control system through solving the boundary-value kinematic problem of orientation of solid body by successive approximation method with prediction. EFFECT: reduction of power requirements; enhanced accuracy of reorientation maneuver for wide class of spacecraft. 2 cl, 2 dwg