Back-Wiring and Complementary Current Loops for Magnetic Dipole Moment Reduction on Satellites Full-Scale Solar Panels

Undesired synthetic magnetic dipole moments (MDMs) from satellite solar panels cause off-course drifts, forcing reaction wheels to compensate at the cost of power. These MDMs also generate spurious torques on the panels and distort magnetometer readings. While several electromagnetic compatibility (EMC) measures exist for DC magnetic cleanliness, complementary current loops (CCL) and back-wiring are particularly promising yet lack quantitative benchmarks. We evaluate both methods on a full-scale 256-cell, 300 W satellite solar panel in three fixed-geometry configurations: conventional (reference), CCL, and back-wired. Under maximum power, MDMs are derived from magnetic torque measurements in an applied field. Extensive computational simulations-covering both field conditions and satellite missions-demonstrate that, for CCL and back-wiring configurations respectively, the magnitude of the effective MDM—under quasi static conditions—is reduced by 80% and 96.9%. Power consumption of the reaction wheel and magnetorquer decreases by 96% and 99.9%, while average magnetometer noise induced by the solar panel is reduced by 78.9% and 95.7%. Furthermore, the average synthetic torques measured under both orbital and sun-tracking dynamics exhibit excellent agreement with those predicted under quasi-static conditions. This approach mitigates attitude control disturbances and magnetometer inaccuracies during the design stage, thereby conserving power and processing resources during missions.