A near-optimal guidance law for the descent trajectory for earth orbit re-entry of a fully reusable single-stage-to-orbit pure rocket launch vehicle is derived. A methodology is developed to investigate using both bank angle and altitude as control variables and selecting parameters that maximize various performance functions. The method is based on the energy-state model of the aircraft equations of motion. The major task of this paper is to obtain optimal re-entry trajectories under a variety of performance goals: minimum time, minimum surface temperature, minimum heating, and maximum heading change; four classes of trajectories were investigated: no banking, optimal left turn banking, optimal right turn banking, and optimal bank chattering. The cost function is in general a weighted sum of all performance goals. In particular, the trade-off between minimizing heat load into the vehicle and maximizing cross range distance is investigated. The results show that the optimization methodology can be used to derive a wide variety of near-optimal trajectories.


    Access

    Access via TIB

    Check availability in my library


    Export, share and cite



    Title :

    Near-Optimal Re-Entry Trajectories for Reusable Launch Vehicles


    Contributors:
    H. C. Chou (author) / M. D. Ardema (author) / J. V. Bowles (author)

    Publication date :

    1997


    Size :

    12 pages


    Type of media :

    Report


    Type of material :

    No indication


    Language :

    English




    Near-Optimal Entry Trajectories for Reusable Launch Vehicles

    H.-C. Chou / M. D. Ardema / J. V. Bowles | AIAA | 1998


    Near-optimal re-entry trajectories for reusable launch vehicles

    Chou, H.-C. / Ardema, M. / Bowles, J. | AIAA | 1997


    Near-Optimal Re-Entry Trajectories for Reusable Launch Vehicles

    Chou, H.-C. / Ardema, M. D. / Bowles, J. V. | NTRS | 1997


    Near-Optimal Re-Entry Trajectories for Reusable Launch Vehicles

    Chou, H. / Ardema, M. / Bowles, J. et al. | British Library Conference Proceedings | 1997