The concept, operation, and predicted performance of an RF tracking control system used to point the Pioneer F/G spacecraft at the Earth is described. This system employs a modified conical scanning technique called Conscan. The signal processor, the most interesting unit of the system, is described in detail to show that it approximates a maximum likelihood estimator. The dynamic behavior of the spacecraft and the stability analysis of the system are presented, demonstrating that the system performance is basically determined by the open-loop phase and amplitude errors introduced by the antenna, receiver, and signal processor. A detailed error budget shows that the phase and amplitude errors are small. Finally, closed-loop simulation and test data are presented to verify the error budget.


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    Title :

    Conical Scanning System for Pioneer Jupiter Spacecraft


    Contributors:


    Publication date :

    1972-03-01


    Size :

    5102009 byte




    Type of media :

    Article (Journal)


    Type of material :

    Electronic Resource


    Language :

    English



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