Temperature control of the inertial-grade floated rate-integrating gyroscope

The performance of the inertial-grade floated rate-integrating gyroscope is critically dependent on the instrument surface temperature distribution. During operation, the instrument is degraded by distributed surface heat-flux disturbances, and it is desired to control the surface temperature distribution in a closed-loop feedback configuration such that the instrument degradation is minimized. This is achieved via optimal control theory, where a distributed feedback controller is determined such that the square of thermally induced drift rate is minimized. The structure of the resulting controller is examined, and various configurations for implementation are suggested.