Investigating Reaction Wheel Configuration and Control Law Pairings for CubeSats in the Presence of Faults

— In this paper, the attitude control of a model CubeSat was simulated using the nonlinear control techniques of feedback linearization and sliding mode control. The dynamic model of the CubeSat was derived based on a reaction wheel actuation system, which was presented in two configurations. The performance of the controllers on the CubeSat were compared in a nominal mode of operation and a faulty mode of operation. The benefit to combining a controller with a specific reaction wheel configuration was also evaluated based on the root mean squared error of the CubeSat attitude and angular velocities. Results show that a sliding mode controller performs better than a feedback linearization controller with a pyramid configuration in a fault mode. However, using attitude error as the evaluation metric for any potential controller-configuration relationship is tenable and other evaluation parameters should be considered