Method for flexible satellite dynamics simulation on three-axis air-bearing table

Because of the Earth gravity, flexible appendages cannot be fixed on the table, three-axis air-bearing table cannot be used to simulate attitude dynamics of a flexible satellite, a method is developed by using momentum wheels to simulate the vibrational disturbance torque of satellite flexible appendages on three-axis air-bearing table. By designing a tracking controller, the air-bearing table's angular velocity is used to track reference dynamics of the flexible satellite, the momentum wheel provide the control torque, i.e. the vibration disturbance torque to be simulated. The theory and mathematical simulations show: (1) This method can simulate low-order flexible vibration disturbance torque well; (2) In theory, the greater the controller gain, the higher frequency of disturbance torque can be simulated. However, because of measurement noise, the feedback gain cannot be too great; (3) Due to the inherent delay of controller and actuator, there is phase delay between the emulational disturbance torque and real disturbance torque. Therefore, a lead-lag correction network is introduced to reduce the effect of phase delay.