Use of an Inertia Sphere to Damp the Angular Motions of Spinning Space Vehicles

A theoretical study was made of a device which might be used to damp the angular motions of spin-stabilized space vehicles with constant moments of inertia. the device was assumed to consist of a rate gyro, a servo control, and a rotor mounted in a single gimbal. The investigation was conducted by considering the general equations of motion of the vehicle-damper system and noting that simplification would result if the damper had a spherical inertia distribution. Such a distribution was assumed thereafter, and a control command was defined so that the gimbal angle would be proportional to the angular velocity of the vehicle about the gimbal axis. The resulting equations were linearized, and the Routh-Hurwitz criterion was applied to determine the conditions for stability. The study included two numerical examples showing possible application of inertia-sphere rate dampers. The general conditions for stability were found to be feasible for practical applications. A simplified stability criterion covers a large class of practical problems

Practice and Pleadings

This article is part of the District of Columbia Survey

Practice and Pleadings

This article is part of the District of Columbia Survey

A Theoretical Study of the Angular Motions of Spinning Bodies in Space

Euler's dynamic equations were linearized and solved analytically. Analytical expressions which relate angular motions to spin-rate and inertia distributions were obtained and found to be in good agreement with machine solutions of the nonlinear equations for the case of a rectangular-pulse pitching-moment disturbance. Consideration was given to the effects produced by having artificial damping in the system

Hanging drop crystal growth apparatus

This invention relates generally to control systems for controlling crystal growth, and more particularly to such a system which uses a beam of light refracted by the fluid in which crystals are growing to detect concentration of solutes in the liquid. In a hanging drop apparatus, a laser beam is directed onto drop which refracts the laser light into primary and secondary bows, respectively, which in turn fall upon linear diode detector arrays. As concentration of solutes in drop increases due to solvent removal, these bows move farther apart on the arrays, with the relative separation being detected by arrays and used by a computer to adjust solvent vapor transport from the drop. A forward scattering detector is used to detect crystal nucleation in drop, and a humidity detector is used, in one embodiment, to detect relative humidity in the enclosure wherein drop is suspended. The novelty of this invention lies in utilizing angular variance of light refracted from drop to infer, by a computer algorithm, concentration of solutes therein. Additional novelty is believed to lie in using a forward scattering detector to detect nucleating crystallites in drop

NUCLEAR AND RADIATION HAZARDS EVALUATION OF SRE FUEL PROCESSING AND STORAGE

Results are presented of an evaluation of nuclear safety and raaiation control related to the shipment, mechanical processing, and storage of SRE-1 fuel elements. (auth

Molecular modeling of inhibitor-protease complexes

Issued as Final progress report, Project G-33-51