Difference between revisions of "Gravity Turn Maneuver"
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Revision as of 16:57, 27 January 2016
Gravity Turn Maneuver | |
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State dimension: | 1 |
Differential states: | 5 |
Continuous control functions: | 1 |
Interior point equalities: | 7 |
The gravity turn or zero lift turn is a common maneuver used to launch spacecraft into orbit from bodies that have non-negligible atmospheres. The goal of the maneuver is to minimize atmospheric drag by always orienting the vehicle along the velocity vector. In this maneuver, the vehicle's pitch is determined solely by the change of the velocity vector through gravitational acceleration and thrust. The goal is to find a launch configuration and thrust control strategy that achieves a specific orbit with minimal fuel consumption.
Contents
Physical description and model derivation
For the purposes of this model, we start with the following ODE system proposed by Culler et. al.:
where is the speed of the vehicle, is the gravitational acceleration at the vehicle's current altitude, is the accelerating force and is the angle between the vertical and the vehicle's velocity vector. In the original version of the model, the authors neglect aspects of the problem:
- Variation of over altitude
- Decrease of vehicle mass due to fuel consumption
- Curvature of the surface
- Atmospheric drag
Changes in gravitational acceleration
To account for changes in , we make the following substitution:
Decrease in vehicle mass
To account for changes in vehicle mass, we consider a differential state with the following derivative:
The vehicle's fuel reserve is modelled by two parameters: denotes the launch mass (with fuel) and denotes the dry mass (without fuel).
Curvature of the reference body's surface
To accomodate the reference body's curvature, we introduce an additional differential state which represents the change in the vehicle's polar angle with respect to the launch site. The derivative is given by
Note that the vertical changes as the vehicle moves around the reference body meaning that the derivative of must be changed as well:
Atmospheric drag
To model atmospheric drag, we assume that the vehicles draf coefficient is constant. The drag force is given by
where is the density of the atmosphere and is the vehicle's reference area. We assume that atmospheric density decays exponentially with altitude:
where is the atmospheric density at altitude zero and is the scale height of the atmosphere. The [drag force] is introduced into the acceleration term:
Note that if the vehicle is axially symmetric and oriented in such a way that its symmetry axis is parallel to the velocity vector, it does not experience any lift forces. This model is simplified. It does not account for changes in temperature and atmospheric composition with altitude. Also, varies with fluid viscosity and vehicle velocity. Specifically, drastic changes in occur as the vehicle breaks the sound barrier. This is not accounted for in this model.
Mathematical formulation
The resulting optimal control problem is given by
where is the maximum thrust of the vehicle's engine and is a small number that is strictly greater than zero.
Parameters
For testing purposes, the following parameters were chosen:
Reference solution
The reference solution was generated using a direct multiple shooting approach with 300 shooting intervals placed equidistantly along the variable-length time horizon. The resulting NLP was implemented using CasADi 2.4.2 using CVodes as an integrator and IPOPT as a solver. The exact code used to solve the problem alongside detailed solution data can be found under Gravity Turn Maneuver (Casadi). The solution achieves the desired orbit in spending of fuel. The launch angle is approximately . The downrange motion throughout the entire launch amounts to a change in polar angle of approximately .
Source Code
Model descriptions are available in
References
CULLER, Glen J.; FRIED, Burton D. Universal gravity turn trajectories. Journal of Applied Physics, 1957, 28. Jg., Nr. 6, S. 672-676.