Robust adaptive fuzzy sliding mode trajectory tracking control for serial robotic manipulators

Abstract

The ever increasingly stringent performance requirements of industrial robotic applications highlight significant importance of advanced robust control designs for serial robots that are generally subject to various uncertainties and external disturbances. Therefore, this paper proposes and investigates the design and implementation of a robust adaptive fuzzy sliding mode controller in the task space for uncertain serial robotic manipulators. The sliding mode control is well known for its robustness to system parameter variations and external disturbances, and is thus a highly desirable and cost-effective approach to achieve high precision control task for serial robots. The proposed controller is designed based on a fuzzy logic approximation to accomplish trajectory tracking with high accuracy and simultaneously attenuate effects from uncertainties. In the controller, the high-frequency uncertain term is approximated by using a fuzzy logic system while the low-frequency term is adaptively updated in real time based on a parametric adaption law. The control efficacy and effectiveness of the proposed control algorithm are comparatively verified against a recently proposed conventional controller. The test results demonstrate that the proposed controller has better trajectory tracking performances and is more robust against large disturbances than the conventional controller under the same operating conditions.