Characterization of a Rotating Magnetic Dipole Field for Contactless Detumbling of Space Debris

Abstract

There is a need for the remediation of space debris, but many objects must be detumbled before they can be safely serviced. In this paper, we describe an empirical study that is the first to evaluate the detumbling performance of a rotating magnetic dipole (MD) field. We develop a new rotatingpermanent-magnet robotic end-effector capable of generating a strong MD field that can be rotated at high speeds. We construct a low-friction experimental apparatus to simulate a tumbling object. We conduct detumbling experiments using a rotating MD field with a variety of angular velocities, as well as the same field held static in two canonical orientations. We provide an estimate of the expected performance of each method in the microgravity environment of space by correcting our data for the friction in our experimental apparatus. We find that a rotating MD field detumbles an object in finite time, whereas a static field only detumbles an object asympotically to zero angular velocity. We find that the rotating MD field substantially outperforms a static MD field in reaching approximately zero angular velocity, provided the angular velocity of the rotating MD exceeds a modest minimum value. Finally, we observe a diminishing return in performance as we continue to increase the angular velocity of the rotating MD field.