Approaching and tracking a maneuvering non-cooperative object using Lyapunov approach

A 6-DOF coupled translational and attitude dynamics model of a non-cooperative target with tumbling and orbital maneuver simultaneously is designed in this paper. On the basis of the relative motion model and the chaser's attitude dynamics described in the line-of-sight coordinate frame, the coupled translational and attitude dynamics model is established. Because of the nonlinearity, pretreatment of the model should be considered first in order to transform the model into another form which is easier to derive; moreover, the control laws for approaching and tracking the target with tumbling and orbital maneuver are derived using the Lyapunov min-max approach. The simulation results and their analysis validate preliminarily the feasibility of our model and control laws.