Detumbling a Flexible Tumbling Target Using a Space Robot in Post-capture Phase

In recent years, the sustained growth of space launch missions has inevitably led to a rapid increase in space debris, which has attracted extensive attention to the capture and removal of space debris. This paper presents a new strategy for detumbling a flexible tumbling target in the post-capture phase using a flexible-base space robot (also called a chaser), which involves trajectory optimization and composite control of the chaser. Based on the dynamic equation of the combined system, the trajectories of the chaser base and the manipulator’s joints are parameterized by quintic polynomial curves, and then are simultaneously optimized for the collision avoidance of the combined system and the reduction of panel deformation, control energy, and mission duration. The Pareto-optimal solutions of the optimization problem are obtained by the multi-objective particle swarm optimization (MOPSO) algorithm. The composite control scheme, composed of a trajectory tracking controller and a vibration suppression controller, is used for the chaser to detumble the target along the planned trajectories, stabilize its base attitude, and eliminate the residual vibration of the flexible panels. Two representative cases are used to verify the effectiveness and robustness of the proposed detumbling strategy for the target with parameter uncertainties.