Low-thrust manoeuvre with polynomial thrust direction

Orekit usage
1

Hello,

I was wondering if you have a suggestion on what would be the best way to implement in Orekit a low-thrust manoeuvre with variable thrust direction that can be described via a polynomial.

I’ve checked and it looks that for low-thrust manoeuvres there is already a ConfigurableLowThrustManoeuvre in which it is possible to define a ThrustDirectionAndAttitudeProvider. In here, I could implement a custom ThrustDirectionProvider based on polynomials.

My other alternative would be to use the ParametricAcceleration class; however, I am less familiar with this class.

Before jumping into an implementation that may take some time, I was wondering is someone has a suggestion on this.

Thanks in advance.

Best,
Mirko

2

Hi @mirkotrisolini,

There’s also the ProfileThrustPropulsionModel that uses a TimeSpanMap of PolynomialThrustSegment that fits well your needs.

Cheers,
Maxime

3

@MaximeJ I couldn’t find this model myself.

Thank you very much for the suggestion; this is really helpful.

Best,
Mirko