Tethered actuator for vibration control of space structures

Highlight
• Effectiveness of a micro-tension actuator for vibration control is confirmed experimentally.
• The nonlinearity of the flexible tether, slackness, is taken into account for the vibration control.
• The feedback controller is designed by means of the Mission Function control algorithm.
• Flexural rigidity of the flexible leverage is studied experimentally to shed light on the effectiveness of the leverages.
• The importance of selection of the rigidity is confirmed for the vibration control of tethered flexible space structures.

Effectiveness of a micro-tension actuator for vibration control of such flexible space structures as the tethered space solar power satellites is experimentally studied on the ground. A flexible leverage is employed as the micro-tension actuator in order to control the microtension of tether. The flexible leverage is connected through a tether to the flexible beam as an experimental model of the flexible solar panel with the low first modal frequency of order 1 Hz. The nonlinearity of the flexible tether is taken into account for the vibration control since the tether becomes ineffective when it slacks, i.e., when it is tension-free. The feedback controller is designed by means of the Mission Function control algorithm. Flexural rigidity of the flexible leverage plays an important role in the vibration suppression and is studied experimentally to shed light on the effectiveness of the leverages with five different kinds of rigidity. The experimental results show not only the effect of the flexural rigidity of the flexible leverage on the control performance of the vibration suppression but also the importance of selection of the rigidity to control the vibration of tethered flexible space structures through the microtension of tethers in space.