Taming the 1.2 m Telescope
Abstract
Achievable residual jitter on the 1.2 m telescope at MSSS shown in Figure 1 has historically been limited to 10-20 arc-sec. peak in moderate wind conditions due to the combination of the dynamics associated with the twin telescopes on the common declination axis shaft, and the related control system behavior. Figure 1 1.2 m Telescope
The lightly damped, low frequency fundamental vibration mode shape of the telescopes rotating out of phase on the common declination axis shaft severely degraded the performance of the prior controllers. This vibration mode is easily excited by external forces such as wind loading and internal torque commands from the mount control system. The relatively poor historic performance was due to a combination of the low error rejection of external disturbances, and the controller exciting the mode. A radical new approach has been implemented that has resulted in a decrease of jitter to less than 1 arcsec under most conditions. The new approach includes minor hardware modifications to provide active damping with accelerometers as feedback sensors. This architecture has allowed a bandwidth increase of almost an order of magnitude and eliminated the large amplitude motions at the mode natural frequency, resulting in much improved pointing and jitter performance. A representative comparison of historical versus new architecture performance is shown in Figure 2 for the declination axis.- Publication:
-
Advanced Maui Optical and Space Surveillance Technologies Conference
- Pub Date:
- September 2013
- Bibcode:
- 2013amos.confE..72G