STATION-KEEPING UNDER CONICAL CONSTRAINT ON THE CONTROL FORCE

Abstract

Many observation satellites are subject to attitude constrains arising from peculiar mission requirements or environmental conditions. These obstructions often constrain the direction of the thrust vector to remain within a cone. In this study, we investigate the local controllability of station-keeping maneuvers of satellites with low thrust capabilities or small chemical impulsions on nominal periodic orbits subject to such constraints. We offer a numerical methodology based on convex optimization to identify the minimum cone angle guaranteeing local controllability for a specific orbit. We compare the results with a dynamical approach using Floquet Modes. An illustrative example inspired by the James Webb Space Telescope is proposed. Specifically, we consider a satellite is on a Halo orbit around L2 in the Sun-Earth circular restricted three-body problem.