UMV control via FOSMO

Abstract

In this work, the speed and direction angle of an unmanned vehicle (UMV) are controlled by using a sliding mode controller (SMC). However, no mechanical speed or position sensor is used to control the speed and direction angle of the UMV. The speed and direction angle of the UMV are estimated using the fractional-order sliding mode observer (FOSMO), wherein the real UMV motor currents and voltages are measured by sensors and the kinematic modal of the UMV is used. The angular speeds of the UMV are approximated with the help of the estimated and real UMV motor currents. Then, the estimated speed and direction angle of the UMV are approximated by estimated angular speed of the UMV and those produced by the FOSMO are used in the SMC, which controls the speed and direction angle of a UMV. Given that fractional-order differential equations and algorithms are used in FOSMO, a more precise control than that in other controllers that use full-order differential equations is achieved. Lyapunov stability theory is also used to establish stability conditions for the observer. Experimental results show that the proposed observer can be perfectly implemented without a mechanical or position sensor and robustly follows different complex reference trajectories.