AbstractLong space tethers are becoming a rising concern as an alternate way for transportation in space. It benefits from fuel economizing. This paper focuses on the dynamics of the tether transportation system, which consists of two end satellites connected by a flexible tether, and a movable vehicle driven by the actuator carried by itself. The Absolute Nodal Coordinate Formulation is applied to the establishment of the equation of motion, so that the influence caused by the distributed mass and elasticity of the tether is introduced. Moreover, an approximated method for accelerating the calculation of the generalized gravitational forces on the tether is proposed by substituting the volume integral every step into summation of finite terms. Afterwards, dynamic evolutions of such a system in different configurations are illustrated using numerical simulations. The deflection of the tether and the trajectory of the crawler during the transportation is investigated. Finally, the effect on the orbit of the system due to the crawler is revealed.

    HighlightsThe ANCF is applied to study the dynamics of the tether transportation system.A fast simulation model with proper assumptions is proposed based on the ANCF.Different configurations of the tether transportation system are investigated.The effect of the model parameters on the system dynamic behavior is tested.


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    Title :

    Dynamic analysis of the tether transportation system using absolute nodal coordinate formulation


    Contributors:
    Sun, Xin (author) / Xu, Ming (author) / Zhong, Rui (author)

    Published in:

    Acta Astronautica ; 139 ; 266-277


    Publication date :

    2017-07-11


    Size :

    12 pages




    Type of media :

    Article (Journal)


    Type of material :

    Electronic Resource


    Language :

    English