Digital solar sensor project for attitude determination

The design of a system of a solar aspect system (SAS) arranged to operate according to a digital principle. The analog-digital conversion of data is made optically by a binary Gray code light mask, that produces a digital indication of the elevation and azimuth angles of incident light from the sun. A prototype of such a system with 0.5 degree of accuracy, using a 7 (seven) bit digital solar sensor, is discussed. A microprocessor system was developed to select and store information of the several sensors distributed around the satellite.