• The entire satellite including its antenna(s) spins
• This means that the satellite's attitude is very stable because the satellite as a whole acting as a gyroscope
• Spinning can be achieved using rods with coils of wire around them
• You pass a current through the rods, creating magnetic fields around the wires
• When this rod's magnetic field interacts with Earth's magnetic field, the rod begins to spin
• If you have rods in three opposing directions you can have your satellite spin stably in all three axes (up, down, and out)
• This process requires only a small amount of power to pass electric current through the three rods, much less total power than using thrusters for attitude control
• Because of the interaction with the Earth's magnetic field, this is an interesting way to map the Earth's magnetic field (this was actually done by British school children using a satellite for their classroom project)
• An advantage of spin stabilized is it requires very little power
• A disadvantage is that the solar panels cannot all collect power all the time because they will spin, so they don't face the sun once every rotation
• Also, the instruments can only take measurements in one direction once every rotation

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Produced by Galactics.
Comments: galactics@spacesim.org.
Last updated on: 8 August 1997.