Development and flight test of an experimental maneuver autopilot for a highly maneuverable aircraft

This report presents the development of an experimental flight test maneuver autopilot (FTMAP) for a highly maneuverable aircraft. The essence of this technique is the application of an autopilot to provide precise control during required flight test maneuvers. This newly developed flight test technique is being applied at the Dryden Flight Research Facility of NASA Ames Research Center. The FTMAP is designed to increase the quantity and quality of data obtained in test flight. The technique was developed and demonstrated on the highly maneuverable aircraft technology (HiMAT) vehicle. This report describes the HiMAT vehicle systems, maneuver requirements, FTMAP development process, and flight results

Short- and Long-Term Propagation of Spacecraft Orbits

The Planetary Observer Planning Software (POPS) comprises four computer programs for use in designing orbits of spacecraft about planets. These programs are the Planetary Observer High Precision Orbit Propagator (POHOP), the Planetary Observer Long-Term Orbit Predictor (POLOP), the Planetary Observer Post Processor (POPP), and the Planetary Observer Plotting (POPLOT) program. POHOP and POLOP integrate the equations of motion to propagate an initial set of classical orbit elements to a future epoch. POHOP models shortterm (one revolution) orbital motion; POLOP averages out the short-term behavior but requires far less processing time than do older programs that perform long-term orbit propagations. POPP postprocesses the spacecraft ephemeris created by POHOP or POLOP (or optionally can use a less accurate internal ephemeris) to search for trajectory-related geometric events including, for example, rising or setting of a spacecraft as observed from a ground site. For each such event, POPP puts out such user-specified data as the time, elevation, and azimuth. POPLOT is a graphics program that plots data generated by POPP. POPLOT can plot orbit ground tracks on a world map and can produce a variety of summaries and generic ordinate-vs.-abscissa plots of any POPP data

An Updated Process for Automated Deepspace Conjunction Assessment

No abstract availabl

Low Lunar Orbit Design via Graphical Manipulation of Eccentricity Vector Evolution

Low lunar orbits, such as those used by GRAIL and LRO, experience predictable variations in the evolution of their eccentricity vectors. These variations are nearly invariant with respect to the initial eccentricity and argument of periapse and change only in the details with respect to the initial semi-major axis. These properties suggest that manipulating the eccentricity vector evolution directly can give insight into orbit maintenance designs and can reduce the number of propagations required. A trio of techniques for determining the desired maneuvers is presented in the context of the GRAIL extended mission

Design of an Extended Mission for GRAIL

The GRAIL extended mission will extend the measurement of the lunar gravity field beyond what was achieved by the primary GRAIL mission this past spring (2012). By lowering the orbits of the two GRAIL spacecraft to less than half the altitude of the primary mission orbits on average, the resolution of the gravity field measurements will be improved by a factor of two, yielding a signicant improvement in our knowledge of the structure of the upper crust of the Moon. The challenges of flying so low and the design which will meet those challenges is presented here

Navigational Challenges for a Europa Flyby Mission

Jupiter's moon Europa is a prime candidate in the search for present-day habitable environments outside of the Earth. A number of missions have provided increasingly detailed images of the complex surface of Europa, including the Galileo mission, which also carried instruments that allowed for a limited investigation of the environment of Europa. A new mission to Europa is needed to pursue these exciting discoveries using close-up observations with modern instrumentation designed to address the habitability of Europa. In all likelihood the most cost effective way of doing this would be with a spacecraft carrying a comprehensive suite of instruments and performing multiple flybys of Europa. A number of notional trajectory designs have been investigated, utilizing gravity assists from other Galilean moons to decrease the period of the orbit and shape it in order to provide a globally distributed coverage of different regions of Europa. Navigation analyses are being performed on these candidate trajectories to assess the total Delta V that would be needed to complete the mission, to study how accurately the flybys could be executed, and to determine which assumptions most significantly affect the performance of the navigation system

Navigation of the GRAIL Spacecraft Pair Through the Extended Mission at the Moon

The GRAIL extended mission (XM) dramatically expands the scope of GRAIL's gravity science investigation by flying the pair of spacecraft at the lowest orbit the flight team can safely support. From the perspective of the Navigation team, the low orbit altitude introduces new challenges. At this lower altitude, navigation is more sensitive to higher-order terms of the gravity field so that orbit determination solutions are more difficult and there is less certainty of achieving maneuver targets. This paper reports on the strategy and performance of the Navigation system for GRAIL's XM. On a weekly basis, the Navigation team provided reference trajectory updates, designed three maneuvers, and reconstructed the execution of those maneuvers. In all, the XM involved 55 planned maneuvers; five were canceled. The results of the Navigation team's efforts, in terms of maintaining the reference-trajectory targets, satisfying requirements, and achieving desired separation distances, are assessed