Precise power descent control of a lunar lander using a single thruster

• Published in: Acta astronautica Vol. 186; pp. 473 - 485
• Main Authors: Cortés-Martínez, Rolando, Kumar, Krishna D., Rodríguez-Cortés, H.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Elmsford Elsevier Ltd 01.09.2021; Elsevier BV
• Subjects: Angular velocity; Complex systems; Computer simulation; Control systems design; Controllers; Descent; Lunar landing; Lunar surface vehicles; Mass budget; Numerical simulations; Onboard equipment; Payloads; Sliding mode control; Stability analysis; Subsystems; Variable structure control
• ISSN: 0094-5765; 1879-2030
• DOI: 10.1016/j.actaastro.2021.06.001

This paper addresses the problem of powered descent control of a lunar lander during its final landing phase, where soft and precise landing at the target cite is required. In the literature, this problem has been solved considering a fully actuated lunar lander. Recently, landers are designed as complex systems with several onboard payloads and subsystems for completing demanding mission tasks. There are increasing constraints on mass budget and space availability onboard a lander. In order to meet these requirements, a novel controller using a single thruster is proposed. The proposed controller has three control inputs (thrust and two gimbaled angles) to control the six degrees of motion of a lander; these control inputs are non-affine. The proposed controller is designed based on variable structure control technique augmented with a high order filter, an immersion and invariance-based mass estimator and a sliding mode angular velocity observer. The stability analysis using Lyapunov theory and the results of the numerical simulations along with Monte Carlo simulations of the system show that the precise landing of the lunar lander using a single thruster is feasible. •The position and attitude control of a lunar lander using a single thruster is examined.•A novel controller along with lander mass and angular velocity observers are designed.•The proposed controller is based on variable structure control technique.•The Lyapunov theory is applied to prove the stability of the proposed control scheme.•Results of numerical simulations show the feasibility of the proposed control scheme.