Model Predictive Control-based Trajectory Tracking Control Method for Unmanned Surface Vessels

Abstract

A controller based on model predictive control (MPC) is designed to track the desired trajectory of unmanned surface vessels (USV) under variable disturbance conditions. Under the interference of wind, wave and current, considering that the underactuated ship has no lateral driving force, the ship model is simplified to a three degree of freedom model on the water surface. After the approximate linearization and discretization of the model, a linear model predictive control method was applied to design a trajectory tracking controller considering the limit constraints of control variables, control increment constraints and exportation constraints. Finally, the tracking performance of the system for circular trajectories is tested and the results are analyzed. The results indicate that the designed controller can achieve the desired control effect, and can withstand a certain degree of environmental disturbances.