Adaptive robust fault-tolerant attitude control of spacecraft with finite-time convergence

This paper aims at investigating finite-time fault-tolerant attitude stabilization control designs for rigid spacecrafts involving two types of actuator faults and modeling uncertainties. In order to express the attitude dynamics in a more convenient manner, the Lagrange-like equation is adopted to describe spacecraft attitude dynamics. Using the terminal sliding mode technique, an on-line adaptive law is employed to estimate the bounds of the uncertainties, and finite-time convergence is achieved by an adaptive fault-tolerant controller in spite of actuator faults. Besides showing fault-tolerant capability, finite-time stability is also guaranteed not only in the reaching phase but also in the sliding phase. Simulation results illustrate the effectiveness of the proposed method.