Methods of Instantaneous Micro-Impulse Measurement
Cun-Yan Cui, Yan-Ji Hong, Guo-Qiang He and Jun Wang
Some techniques and methods of instantaneous micro-impulse measurement are compared. The impact pendulum and a method of calculating based on the Kalman Filter is introduced, which is convenient in acquiring the impulse of a laser thruster. A special method is set up to manage the difficulties met with by us during the process of measuring impulse of laser thruster with liquid propellant. The method is to calibrate the information obtained by the piezoelectric sensor testing system with that measured by the impact pendulum. It is demonstrated that all three methods are suited to measure the impulse of a laser thruster with different materials after analyzing the experiment process and comparing the results with those reported.