The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Nov. 30, 1999
Filed:
Feb. 18, 1997
Applicant:
Inventors:
Donald W Gamble, Menlo Park, CA (US);
Mark D McLaren, Redwood City, CA (US);
Marc Takahashi, Menlo Park, CA (US);
Assignee:
Space Systems/Loral, Inc., Palo Alto, CA (US);
Attorney:
Primary Examiner:
Int. Cl.
CPC ...
B64G / ;
U.S. Cl.
CPC ...
244164 ; 244165 ; 244169 ; 244171 ; 2441 / ;
Abstract
A spacecraft ground loop controller (GLC), located on the Earth, interfaces with a satellite ground station receiving spacecraft telemetry from the downlink baseband equipment and automatically sending spacecraft commands through the command uplink baseband equipment to control the attitude of an orbiting spacecraft and achieve partial orbit control using commanded thruster firings and magnetic torquer polarity and magnitude. A cooperative approach of using all available thrusters, of both the primary and redundant strings, provides greater fuel savings.