Design and realization of the miniature long-life integrative coded sun sensor

This paper describes the research activity at the Beijing institute of control engineering about the miniature long-life integrative coded sun sensor. The light system of the miniature coded sun sensor is composed with a semi-column silex glass, a cube silex with coded shape on the bottom and an integrative silicon battery with 14 cells. The sun line forms a light spot through the slit on light system on the coded plate. The sensor determines the orientation of sun through the position of light spot. With the limitation of the diameter of sun plate the accuracy of only 0.5° can be realized with 8-bit coarse code in FOV of 124°. To achieve high accuracy of 0.05° the subdivision technique must be adopted. The main scheme of the miniature long-life integrative coded sun sensor is integrating the light system and the signal processing circuits in one mechanical house, using FPGA to calculate the angle, generate the control signal of Multiplexer and AD and realize the function of UART, using flexibility board to connect analog board and digital board, using second power of the satellite, using RS422 interface to communicate with central computer. The performance of the miniature long-life integrative coded sun sensor is listed as below : FOV 124°x124°,accuracy 0.05°(3σ), resolution 14″, power consumption 0.5W,update rate 40Hz,mass 475g, designed life-time 15 years. It has been adopted in the new platform of Remote Sensing Satellite of CAST. The first flight will be at 2015.