Integrated trajectory planning into automatic berthing control of underactuated ship based on fuzzy-backstepping method

Abstract

The trajectory planning and automatic berthing control are traditionally studied separately; however, the planned trajectory is indeed required to be the reference trajectory for the automatic berthing control system. In this paper, a novel trajectory planning strategy is presented and integrated into the automatic berthing control of underactuated ship. First, a novel trajectory planning strategy, including the Bezier curve planning, the least square fitting, and the speed assignment mechanism, is presented for the first time herein to provide the differentiable reference trajectory for the automatic berthing control system based on backstepping method. Second, a novel coordinate transformation between the Earth-fixed frame and the berth-fixed frame is established for the first time herein for the arbitrary berth position. Third, the fuzzy logic system is incorporated into backstepping controller to alleviate the influence of the model uncertainty, which is probably introduced by the shallow water and bank effects. The closed-loop signals are proved to be stable based on Lyapunov theorem. Two simulations are conducted to illustrate the effectiveness and advantages of the presented fuzzy-backstepping-based automatic berthing control methodology.