The ACE IDEA approach for satellite despinning maneuver

The ACE IDEA (attitude control expressed in the direction of equivalent axis) approach selects a special coordinate frame for the despinning maneuver of a satellite. Within this frame, there is only one equation of motion because the despinning becomes a plane motion. Furthermore, that equation is linear. Numerically, this presents a much easier problem than the three nonlinear Euler equations. The computation time required for the control of the despinning maneuver is also much shorter, since there is only one scalar equation instead of the conventional three equations