A “Spring–mass” model of tethered satellite systems: properties of planar periodic motions

This paper is devoted to the dynamics in a central gravity field of two point masses connected by a massless tether (the so called “spring–mass” model of tethered satellite systems). Only the motions with straight strained tether are studied, while the case of “slack” tether is not considered. It is assumed that the distance between the point masses is substantially smaller than the distance between the system’s center of mass and the field center. This assumption allows us to treat the motion of the center of mass as an unperturbed Keplerian one, so to focus our study on attitude dynamics. A particular attention is given to the family of planar periodic motions in which the center of mass moves on an elliptic orbit, and the point masses never leave the orbital plane. If the eccentricity tends to zero, the corresponding family admits as a limit case the relative equilibrium in which the tether is elongated along the line joining the center of mass with the field center. We study the bifurcations and the stability of these planar periodic motions with respect to in-plane and out-of-plane perturbations. Our results show that the stable motions take place if the eccentricity of the orbit is sufficiently small.

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