In order to realize the three-axis attitude control of solar sail

this paper employed a new type of actuator

rotating panel-sliding mass

to study its control strategy. A strong robust attitude controller was proposed based on the sliding mode control theory to reduce the influence of the variable inertia moment of the spacecraft on the attitude system. In addition

the adaptive law was introduced and an adaptive disturbance-rejection control law was proposed to suppress the disturbances caused by the solar radiation pressure torque and gravitational gradient torque. Lastly

a steering law was designed for the actuator based on its dynamics to supply the control torque required by the controller

then the rotation angles of rotating panels and sliding displacements of sliding masses were calculated using the steering law. The simulation results showed that the proposed control law and the actuator steering law drove the attitude of solar sail maneuver to desired position quickly

and well resisted the influences of the variation of the inertia moment and the disturbances from solar radiation pressure torque and the gravitational gradient torque. The control torques

the angles of the rotating panels

and the displacements of the sliding masses were kept in proper amplitude range as well. The proposed control strategy effectively realized the three-axis attitude control of solar sail.