Synthesis of a linearly interpolated gain scheduling controller for large flexible spacecraft ETS-VIII

This paper illustrates a design procedure for a linearly interpolated gain scheduling controller for Engineering Test Satellite VIII (ETS-VIII) using its linear parameter-varying (LPV) model. The LPV model here consists of piecewise-linear functions of the paddle rotation angle and a norm-bounded perturbation. The main purpose of this research is to derive a simple structured scheduling law that can be easily implemented in a satellite onboard computer. The derived gain has only two grid points and is scheduled simply by linear interpolation, which is desirable from the standpoint of implementability. Moreover, since the synthesis condition is based on parameter-dependent Lyapunov functions, it gives less conservative results than existing methods. Simulation results are presented to show the effectiveness of the proposed synthesis.

Research highlights
► A novel synthesis condition for a linearly interpolated gain scheduling controller.
► The condition can be solved using standard LMI solvers.
► An LPV model of a large flexible satellite is introduced to apply the condition.
► The designed controller can be easily implemented in a satellite onboard computer.
► It achieves a required performance level with low online computational costs.