Design and experiment on small satellite formation flying simulation platform

Small Satellite Formation Flying (SSFF) simulation system can reveal many problems during the system design of SSFF. It will also finger out how to improve the whole system, which will make SSFF much more reliable. In this paper, a Small Satellite Formation Flying Simulation Platform (SSFFSP) is established, on which many components and devices of satellite can be tested and verified. The SSFFSP is made up of several simulative satellites and one control center. Each simulative satellite consists of several kinds of sensors and actuators, which are either physical or simulated. Five running modes are given for the formation flying control. Simulative satellites communicate with each other through the inter-satellite network. An inter-satellite network with rive layers is established and protocols are designed to meet the needs of SSFF. The inter-satellite network can support formation control, states measurement, operation of riles, operation of space missions, program uploading and updating, and network management. The SSFFSP is applied to some projects and experiments. Simulations and experiments on relative distance measurement of satellites based on GPS are given.