Abstract
In recent years, the demand of the on-orbit inspection has been rising because of the increasing in size of spacecrafts which require deployment of themselves on-orbit, dramatic increase in the number of space debris and so on. In this paper, an on-orbit inspection system of a separable inspection device (a deputy satellite) controlled with Coulomb force is presented. Coulomb force can be controlled with some charge control devices mounted on the main satellite. A sequential guidance, navigation and control method is proposed for the deputy satellite to be guided to a specified position and kept the direction of the inspection device to point toward the main satellite. Control of all degree-of-freedom of movement can be achieved with only the main satellite utilizing electrostatic induction on the deputy satellite. The feasibility of proposed method is evaluated with a numerical simulation in terms of position control accuracy, attitude one and electricity consumption.
