Reaction Control System

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Meaning

Reaction Control System

References

• Colonial Viper
• Colonial Battlestar

Description

The reaction control system is designed to provide a spacecraft with guidance and steering. It has two main functions:

• Delivering small amounts of thrust in any desired direction or combination of directions
• Providing torque to allow control of rotation (pitch, yaw, and roll).

Reaction control systems are typically used for:

• Attitude control during entry into an atmosphere until such time as conventional aerodynamic surfaces can be used
• Stationkeeping in orbit
• Close maneuvering and/or docking
• Orientation control (pointing the nose of the vehicle).

Colonial Use

All Colonial vessels utilise RCS systems for manoeuvring / station keeping, although the scale of the systems varies widely.

• Vipers, Raptors and all smaller craft appear to use "cold" RCS systems, most likely utilising either an inert gas or possibly a high specific-impulse hypergolic fuel mixture. Hypergolics seem more probable as cold gas thrusters have low specific impulse and wouldn't provide sufficiant thrust to allow for the violent combat manuvers typical of Viper/Raider dogfighting. Most real-world manned spacecraft designs utilize hypergolic fuels for their thrusters.
• Very large vessels use strategically-mounted sets of very large fuel-burning thrusters, relying on the brute force of such systems to overcome interia during manoeuvres.

Cylon Use

Cylon manuevering technology is unclear at this time. However, it is likely their vehicle use RCS systems that are similar in form and function to Colonial systems. The episode Scar clearly depicted a Cylon Raider using RCS jets for attitude control, the exhaust plumes of these thrusters were apparently identical to those of the Colonial vessels depicted so they probably use the same or similar technologies, at least for small fighter craft.