CCD tracker development at the Starfire Optical Range

A new tracker is under development at the Starfire Optical Range. The tracker is based on a high-speed CCD camera running at 5000 frames per second. A suite of hardware and software that allows unprecedented flexibility in control system design and implementation delivers the mirror control signals. This paper discusses the design and implementation of the entire tracker system, including the camera design and control algorithms implemented. Two control strategies are investigated: simple integral control and linear quadratic gaussian/loop transfer recovery (LQG/LTR). Experimental results are presented for each of the control system algorithms tested.