An Integrated Trajectory Planning and Motion Control Strategy of a Variable Rotational Speed Pump-Controlled Electro-Hydraulic Actuator

Abstract

This article proposes an integrated two-loop motion control strategy of an electro-hydraulic actuator, in which the cylinder actuator is driven by a variable speed pump to track a desired trajectory. The control strategy combines constrained trajectory planning (outer loop) with nonlinear motion control (inner loop) to achieve accurate trajectory tracking of electro-hydraulic actuators under constraints. A nonlinear filter-type trajectory planner is utilized as the outer loop to synthesize the optimal trajectory, reaching the desired reference with the minimum time while fulfilling the constraints. A full-state constraints assignment approach is proposed, including motion and pressure state constraints. Furthermore, to accurately track the synthesized trajectory of the outer loop, a model-based adaptive robust backstepping motion controller is designed as the inner loop, which can realize guaranteed robustness and high accuracy of the trajectory tracking in the presence of dynamic nonlinearities and parametric uncertainties of the electro-hydraulic actuator. Experiments with contrast control strategies and practical trajectories are conducted, which comprehensively verify the advantages of the proposed integrated two-loop control strategy.