Control of an Orbital Manipulator with Reaction Wheels for On-orbit Servicing

In on-orbit servicing missions, a spacecraft equipped with manipulator arm grasps client satellite. Afterwards, the momentum-dumping phase follows and can be utilized for tasks. Once momentum has been dumped, desired configuration base attitude may needed initializing such as berthing. The proposed approach prioritizes maintenance of servicer spacecraft, reconfigures grasped satellite in nullspace servicer's attitude. utilizes redundancy rotational degrees freedom, provided by reaction wheels, to decouple reconfiguration task from servicer-base. controller shows convergence joint-level task, independent kinematic singularities arm. Additionally, problem speed saturation wheels is tackled increasing damping torques function wheel speed. Simulation results verify effectiveness control approach.