Singularity Analysis and Steering Control Laws for Adaptive-skew Pyramid-type Control Moment Gyros

In contrast to past studies that have treated the skew angle as fixed in pyramid-type control moment gyro (CMG) systems, this paper treats the adaptive-skew pyramid-type CMG (ASCMG) system, in which the skew angle is one of the control variables for generating torques. The singular surfaces of the fixed-skew CMG are analyzed and visualized to illustrate how they depend on the skew angle, and the singular surfaces of the ASCMGs are also analyzed and visualized from a viewpoint of null motion for not only the gimbal angle but also the skew angle. The steering control laws are presented, and we numerically study their effectiveness for the reduction of settling time as compared to the fixed-skew pyramid-type CMGs