The advantage of solar sails in deep space exploration is that no fuel consumption is required. The heliocentric distance is one factor influencing the solar radiation pressure force exerted on solar sails. In addition, the solar radiation pressure force is also related to the solar sail orientation with respect to the sunlight direction. For an ideal flat solar sail, the cone angle between the sail normal and the sunlight direction determines the magnitude and direction of solar radiation pressure force. In general, the cone angle can change from 0°to 90°. However, in practical applications,a large cone angle may reduce the efficiency of solar radiation pressure force and there is a strict requirement on the attitude control. Usually, the cone angle range is restricted less more than an acute angle(for example, not more than40°) in engineering practice. In this paper, the time-optimal transfer trajectory is designed over a restricted range of the cone angle, and an indirect method is used to solve the two point boundary value problem associated to the optimal control problem. Relevant numerical examples are provided to compare with the case of an unrestricted case, and the effects of different maximum restricted cone angles are discussed.The results indicate that(1) for the condition of a restricted cone-angle range the transfer time is longer than that for the unrestricted case and(2) the optimal transfer time increases as the maximum restricted cone angle decreases.
The orbits of solar sails can be changed by adjusting the sail’s attitude through external control torques.The resulting momentum will be changed,either provided by a typical attitude control subsystem or by a propellantless device.This paper investigates the extra momentum input and fuel consumption for a typical attitude control subsystem.The minimum-time transfer trajectories are designed for two rendezvous missions using both indirect and direct methods,generating continuous and discrete attitude histories,respectively.The results show that the momentum variation is almost wholly due to the solar radiation pressure.The feasibility of using tip-mounted microthrusters for attitude control is evaluated.The results show that less than0.1 kg of propellant are required for an interplanetary transfer mission when pulsed plasma thrusters with a specific impulse of700 s and a thrust of 150 mN are mounted at the tip of a 20 m square solar sail.The fuel consumptions of two transfer missions indicate that a tip-mounted pulsed plasma thruster is a viable technique for the attitude control of a solar sail.
