Abstract: A gimbal drive assembly (GDA) for intersatellite link antenna (ILA) is required with long life, huge drive torque, high pointing accuracy, and adaptability to complex and atrocious space environments. Harmonic drive with many advantages such as high reduction ratio, high loading capacity, and high transmission accuracy is applied widely in aeronautics and astronautics fields. Design constraints are briefly analyzed, advantages and disadvantages among three different types of dualaxis structures are campared, a type of structure layout for the single axis actuator is proposed, motor, harmonic drive and angle sensor as well as of points thermal interface design are analyzed, critical techniques including compact and lightweight structure, long life lubrication and high pointing accuracy are pointed,and finally test methods for verifing long life and high pointing accuracy are presented in this paper.

Key words: intersatellite link antenna, harmonic drive, structure layout, long life lubrication, pointing accuracy;