Development of a magnetic acquisition and attitude control system for spinning rocket payloads

An attitude control system capable of pointing the roll principle axis of a spinning payload to within one degree of the magnetic field vector was flown successfully in 1981-82 aboard three Black Brant X payloads and one Terrier Malemute payload, and additional flights with the system have been requested. Using a filtered linear combination of signals provided by a single-axis rate gyro and a two-axis magnetometer, and control actuation from two cold-gas thrusters, the system can be assembled from standard rocket components and fitted to any payload size.