Control Law Design Research Articles

Directional control law functional analysis and design for civil aircraft simulator

Abstract Functional analyses of directional flight control law for a typical civil aircraft are conducted, including directional maneuver, rudder limiter, coordinated turn, Yaw Damper, Thrust Asymmetrical Compensation, Gust Alleviation, manual rudder trim, etc. Through inputs of doublet, step input, and sweeping frequency, open loop control characteristics are analyzed based on a linearized state-space matrix. Simulink block architecture of a closed-loop directional control law is constructed, aiming to fulfill flight control functions, including pedal-to-rudder control, Yaw Damper, coordinated turn, and gain-tuned rudder limiter. Simulations for the previously designed closed-loop directional control law are performed to verify the characteristics of directional handling qualities in the aspect of the Yaw Damper, directional static and dynamic stability, maneuverability, and sweeping frequency.

Multi Combustor Turbine Engine Acceleration Process Control Law Design

Abstract Focusing on the collaborative fuel supply and acceleration problem of multi combustor turbine engine, a variable geometry composite regulation acceleration control law design method based on the combination of compressor intermediate stage air bleed(CIB) and low-pressure turbine guide vanes(LTGV) is proposed. The multi combustor collaborative fuel supply law and variable geometry regulation law during acceleration process are obtained by Particle Swarm Optimization-Sequence Quadratic Program (PSO-SQP) optimization, and the composite regulation acceleration control strategy of dual/single combustion chamber idle acceleration process is explored. The multi combustor acceleration process simulation results indicate that the variable geometry composite regulation method can effectively alleviate the stability margin limitation of the compressor during the initial acceleration stage. Compared with conventional acceleration methods, the maximum relative reduction in acceleration time of our method reaches 26%; Enhancing the combustion exergy efficiency during the acceleration process can significantly improve the engine's acceleration performance.; For the acceleration process from single combustion chamber idle operation to normal operation of a dual combustion chamber, simultaneous fuel supply from both combustion chambers during acceleration has a shorter acceleration time. The research results of this paper can provide important references for the design of transition state control systems for multi combustor turbine engines.

Active maneuver load alleviation for a pitching wing via spanwise-distributed camber morphing

This paper presents the design and verification of a nonlinear model inversion (NMI) controller for the maneuver load alleviation of a pitching oscillating wing based on spanwise-distributed active camber morphing. Recurrent neural networks (RNNs) are used to predict nonlinear and unsteady aerodynamic forces due to wing's large amplitude pitching maneuver, and a fully connected neural network is introduced to build the dynamic inversion of the aeroelastic system for control law design. The inversed system is concatenated with a PI controller to assemble a nonlinear active controller. The controller is first utilized in an offline environment for a 1DoF pitching finite-span wing with spanwise-distributed active camber morphing and then verified in CFD-based fluid-structure-control coupling simulation. The results show that the offline controller could eliminate the maneuver load. In the online CFD-based fluid-structure-control simulation, the bending moment can be alleviated by 38%.

Nonlinear control of the permanent magnet synchronous motor PMSM using input-output linearization control and sliding mode control

Today, electric machines are becoming increasingly important in all sectors (industrial drives, the automotive industry, aviation, traction systems, and agriculture, etc.). Among these machines, permanent magnet synchronous machines (PMSMs) hold a significant place in the control of industrial mechanisms, automated systems, and in the fields of renewable energy like (wind energy, solar energy, and hybrid systems, etc ). Currently, in variable speed drives, the use of PMSM, especially for low power and certain special industrial applications, is replacing DC motors and asynchronous motors because they offer higher efficiency, power factor, and torque density. Moreover, PMSM do not have an excitation circuit in the rotor, which leads to reduced maintenance demands. The control of permanent magnet synchronous machines (PMSM) presents significant challenges due to their nonlinear behavior. Classical linear controllers, such as PI, perform well with linear systems that have constant parameters. However, for nonlinear systems with varying parameters, the conventional control methods may prove insufficient and exhibit a lack of robustness. To address the issues and achieve decoupled machine control, various methods have been proposed. Nonlinear robust control techniques have been extensively explored within the domain of power electronics and drive systems. Included in these, sliding mode control and nonlinear input-output feedback linearization (IOFL). Sliding mode control (SMC) is a control technique known for its excellent dynamic performance in PMSM drives. It offers high robustness and straightforward implementation in both software and hardware. However, a significant drawback of this method is the chattering phenomenon. By the way the input/output linearization control can provide good behavior in steady and dynamic regimes and also provides good decoupling between system variables. This article presents a design of tow control laws based on sliding mode and feedback linearization controller based on input-output feedback linearization to adjust the speed of a permanent magnet synchronous motor (PMSM). To highlight the effectiveness of the designed controllers, a comparison was carried out Matlab Simulink, revealing that the feedback linearization controller outperforms the SMC.

Trajectory tracking control of underwater tracked vehicle considering ICR longitudinal deviation compensation

During the operation of an underwater tracked vehicle on a soft substrate, the instantaneous center of rotation (ICR) no longer coincides with the geometric center after the longitudinal offset is accounted for by the external environment. Due to this, designing an underwater trajectory tracking system based on a kinematic model is a challenging task. In order to achieve the high-precision trajectory tracking control of underwater tracked vehicles, this paper proposes a trajectory tracking algorithm based on the kinematic model of tracked vehicles. First, an inverse tangent algorithm is proposed to address the problem that the front viewpoint of the Stanley algorithm may not be on the target path and cause deviation. Second, by using the inverse tangent algorithm to introduce the target bow angle, as well as combining the mechanisms by which biological endocrine hormones are regulated with the advantages of single-neuron proportional–integral–derivative (PID), a composite endocrine intelligent control law is proposed for the design of the lateral control law of an underwater tracked vehicle; a longitudinal control law is designed based on the longitudinal offset of the ICR obtained by the estimation of the unscented Kalman filter as a means of compensating for longitudinal errors. Finally, a kinematic model is used in order to determine the desired drive wheel speed of the underwater tracked vehicle. The method is compared with the method without longitudinal deviation compensation, then with the methods presented in related literature, and finally, a certain degree of experimental validation is carried out. These results validate the effectiveness of the proposed method.

Nonlinear hysteresis system control based on sliding mode neural network and observer

In this paper, a sliding mode neural network controller with observer is presented and employed in a nonlinear hysteresis system to eliminate the system’s unknown hysteresis and uncertainties. First, a sliding mode controller is proposed for trajectory tracking, which simplifies the computational complexity and ensures robustness. Second, radial basis function neural network is applied for approximating unknown nonlinear function in the control system. Then, an observer is utilized to estimate and observe the hysteresis nonlinearity and cancel the effect of the hysteresis phenomenon. Based on the proposed control scheme, the influence of hysteresis is suppressed, and the system has robust stability and achieves high output tracking performance. Finally, theoretical analysis and numerical simulations confirm the effectiveness of the designed control law.

Non-overshooting sliding mode for UAV control

AbstractFor a class of uncertain systems, a non-overshooting sliding mode control is presented to make them globally exponentially stable and without overshoot. Even when the unknown stochastic disturbance exists, and the time-variant reference trajectory is required, the strict non-overshooting stabilisation is still achieved. The control law design is based on a desired second-order sliding mode (2-sliding mode), which successively includes two bounded-gain subsystems. Non-overshooting stability requires that the system gains depend on the initial values of system variables. In order to obtain the global non-overshooting stability, the first subsystem with non-overshooting reachability compresses the initial values of the second subsystem to a given bounded range. By partitioning these initial values, the bounded system gains are determined to satisfy the robust non-overshooting stability. In order to reject the chattering in the controller output, a tanh-function-based sliding mode is developed for the design of smoothed non-overshooting controller. The proposed method is applied to a UAV trajectory tracking when the disturbances and uncertainties exist. The control laws are designed to implement the non-overshooting stabilisation in position and attitude. Finally, the effectiveness of the proposed method is demonstrated by the flying tests.

Input delay compensation of nonlinear systems with uncertain time-varying parameters

A robust adaptive control law is designed for the class of nonlinear systems with uncertain time-varying parametric dynamics and input delays. The Constitution of control law design is based on filtered tracking errors, previous values of control input and estimate of uncertain parameters which is updated by the update law. An arbitrary large input delay compensation is guaranteed by deriving sufficient control gain conditions using Lyapunov-Krassovskii based stability analysis. The efficacy of the design is verified by Simulation results of two-link robot manipulator dynamical system.

Neuro‐adaptive prescribed performance control for spacecraft rendezvous based on the fully‐actuated system approach

AbstractThis paper investigates the control problem of spacecraft rendezvous with obstacle constraint, considering the external disturbance forces caused by orbit perturbation. Firstly, the translational dynamic model of spacecraft rendezvous is given and then rewritten into a second‐order fully‐actuated system form. Then, by employing the prescribed performance control method, the performance function and error transformation are determined, pre‐defining the prescribed performance bounds. Moreover, the fully‐actuated system approach is used to linearize the original nonlinear system, which simplifies the processes of control law design and ensures model accuracy. After that, to ensure that the spacecraft could avoid the dangerous zone during its manoeuvre, the artificial potential function is introduced, based on which a sliding mode surface is designed. Finally, the prescribed performance control–artificial potential function‐based control law is derived, further adopting the neuro‐adaptive method to deal with external interferences. The stability of the close‐loop control system is analysed through the Lyapunov approach and the effectiveness of the proposed control scheme is verified by carrying out a numerical simulation.

Velocity‐free attitude coordination control of multiple rigid spacecraft with practical predefined‐time convergence

AbstractThe issue of velocity‐free practical predefined‐time (PPT) attitude coordination control (ACC) for multiple rigid spacecraft under directed topology and subject to bounded external disturbances is investigated in the article. To gain precise estimates of the spacecraft's velocities together with external disturbances, PPT extended‐state observers are presented by virtue of a time‐varying function technique. Next, distributed PPT state observers are designed to estimate the leader's attitude which is accessible to only some of the followers. One advantage of the designed distributed observers is that the information required to transmit among neighbor spacecraft is only the estimated attitudes, which results in a reduction of the communication burden. Then, a distributed velocity‐free PPT ACC law is put forward in terms of the backstepping approach and the PPT observers. The present control protocol can ensure that the settling time is bounded by a predefined time with no reliance on any other controller parameters or initial conditions. Finally, the efficiency of the developed ACC scheme is illustrated by numerical simulation examples, and it is shown that the designed control law possesses one further salient advantage of required reduced magnitudes of control torques to reach accurate ACC performance.

Dynamic event-triggered neuro-optimal control for uncertain nonlinear systems with unknown dead-zone constraint

In this article, we propose a dynamic event-triggered neuro-optimal control scheme (DETNOC) for uncertain nonlinear systems subject to unknown dead-zone and disturbances through the design of a composite control law. An integral sliding mode-based discontinuous control law is utilized to compensate for the effects of unknown dead-zone, disturbance, and a component of uncertainties. As a result, a system dynamics that evolves free of these effects during the sliding mode is obtained. Then, an adaptive dynamic programming-based dynamic event-triggered optimal control law is designed to stabilize the sliding mode dynamics with the help of critic-only neural network architecture. Finally, stability analysis of the closed-loop system is provided and the effectiveness of the developed DETNOC scheme is verified.

Model-free composite sliding mode adaptive control for 4-DOF tower crane

For the 4-DOF tower crane system, the lack of actuated number brings great challenges to the realization of accurate positioning and effective swing suppression, particularly with system uncertainties and disturbances. To address this, a model-free composite sliding mode (CSM) adaptive control method for 4-DOF tower crane system with multiple types of uncertainties is proposed. Specifically, the CSM surfaces are constructed by coupling the driving and non-driving variables to enhance the ability to suppress swing. Based on CSM surfaces, not only the asymptotic stability of the system equilibrium point is proved, but also the continuity of the designed control law is ensured. In addition, according to time delay estimation (TDE) technique, system uncertainties and disturbances are dealt with, and achieving model-free control. Finally, the controller is implemented on a 4-DOF tower crane experiment platform, and the effectiveness of the proposed control strategy is verified by four sets of hardware experiments.

Flow control by a hybrid use of machine learning and control theory

PurposeFlow control has a great potential to contribute to a sustainable society through mitigation of environmental burden. However, the high dimensional and nonlinear nature of fluid flows poses challenges in designing efficient control laws using the control theory. This paper aims to propose a hybrid method (i.e. machine learning and control theory) for feedback control of fluid flows, by which the flow is mapped to the latent space in such a way that the linear control theory can be applied therein.Design/methodology/approachThe authors propose a partially nonlinear linear system extraction autoencoder (pn-LEAE), which consists of convolutional neural networks-based autoencoder (CNN-AE) and a custom layer to extract low-dimensional latent dynamics from fluid velocity field data. This pn-LEAE is designed to extract a linear dynamical system so that the modern control theory can easily be applied, while a nonlinear compression is done with the autoencoder (AE) part so that the latent dynamics conform to that linear system. The key technique is to train this pn-LEAE with the ground truths at two consecutive time instants, whereby the AE part retains its capability as the AE, and the weights in the linear dynamical system are trained simultaneously.FindingsThe authors demonstrate the effectiveness of the linear system extracted by the pn-LEAE, as well as the designed control law’s effectiveness for a flow around a circular cylinder at the Reynolds number of ReD = 100. When the control law derived in the latent space was applied to the direct numerical simulation, the lift fluctuations were suppressed over 50%.Originality/valueTo the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first attempt using CNN-AE for linearization of fluid flows involving transient development to design a feedback control law.

Research on morphing aircraft maneuver control based on active disturbance rejection control

Aiming at the problems of model uncertainties caused by morphing aircraft during morphing process and disturbance encountered when maneuvering, a morphing aircraft maneuver control method based on active disturbance rejection control (ADRC) is proposed to eliminate the influences of model uncertainty and external disturbance and improve the rapidity and accuracy of maneuver control. Firstly, a nonlinear model for morphing aircraft is established and the impact mechanism of morphing process is analyzed. Then, the ADRC technique is used to design the angular rate robust control law and the control performance of ADRC law is analyzed under the influence of disturbance. Finally, the immelmann turn maneuver is selected to verify the performance of the designed control law with aerodynamic parameters perturbation combined with the morphing process. The simulation results show that the method possesses good decoupling effect and strong disturbance rejection ability. Moreover, the aircraft's maneuverability and the control margin of control surface can be effectively improved through morphing

Experimental Study on the Longitudinal Motion Performance of a Spherical Robot Rolling on Sandy Terrain

To provide the necessary theoretical models of sphere–soil interaction for the structural design, motion control, and simulation of spherical robots, this paper derives analytical expressions for traction force and driving torque when spherical robots slide and sink into sandy terrain, based on terramechanics and multibody dynamics. Furthermore, orthogonal experimental analysis identifies the load, joint angular acceleration, and maximum joint angular velocity of spherical robots as influencing factors, highlighting that the load significantly affects their longitudinal motion performance. Experimental results indicate that rolling friction and additional resistance on sandy terrain cannot be ignored. The corrected theoretical model effectively replicates the temporal variation of driving torque exerted by spherical robots on sandy terrain. Numerical computations and experimental analyses demonstrate that increasing the radius of the sphere shell, the load, and the slip ratio all lead to increased traction force and driving torque. However, traction force and driving torque begin to decrease once the slip ratio reaches approximately 0.5. Therefore, in the design of spherical robot structures and control laws, appropriate parameters such as load and slip ratio should be chosen based on the established sphere–soil interaction theoretical model to achieve high-quality longitudinal motion performance on sandy terrain.

Commonalities between robust hybrid incremental nonlinear dynamic inversion and proportional-integral-derivative flight control law design

Incremental Nonlinear Dynamic Inversion (INDI) has received substantial interest in the recent years as a nonlinear flight control law design methodology that features inherent robustness against bare airframe aerodynamic variations. However, systematic studies into the robust design benefits of INDI-based control over the classical divide-and-conquer philosophy have been scarce. To bridge this gap, this paper compares the setup of hybrid INDI with a standard industry benchmark that is based on two-degree-of-freedom gain-scheduled proportional-integral-derivative control. This is done on an architectural basis and in terms of achievable robust stability and performance levels with respect to a common set of design requirements. To this end, a non-smooth, multi-objective H∞-synthesis algorithm is used that incorporates mixed parametric and dynamic uncertainties in the design objective and constraints. It is shown that close similarities exist between hybrid INDI design and gain-scheduled PID control, which leads to virtually equivalent robustness and performance outcomes in both linear time-invariant and linear time-varying contexts. It is therefore concluded that the main benefit of the hybrid INDI does not lie in improved robustness properties per se, but in the opportunity to perform modular robust design in an implicit model-following context. Specifically, this implies that the areas of flying qualities, robustness, and nonlinear implementation are directly visible and accessible in the control law structure.

Research on an Ice Tolerance Control Method for Large Aircraft Based on Adaptive Dynamic Inversion

Considering the effect of icing on aircraft control performance, this paper proposes an adaptive dynamic inverse ice tolerance control method based on piecewise constant. A control allocation algorithm is introduced to compensate for the change of control surface performance caused by icing. This method can achieve satisfactory disturbance estimation accuracy under a given sampling time, and thus ensure a closed-loop system error within an acceptable range. The proposed design method is applied to the design of a flight control law for a transport aircraft, aiming to solve the problem of ice-tolerant flight control, reduce the influence of icing conditions on controllability and safe flight of the transport aircraft, and thus improve the flight quality of the transport aircraft. The simulation results are verified under the influence of both standby ice type and failure ice type, and the interference effect on aircraft aerodynamic parameters is further added. The simulation results show that adaptive dynamic inverse control based on piecewise constant can overcome the influence caused by icing and aerodynamic parameter interference, achieve accurate tracking of command, and provide excellent fault tolerance and robustness, which ensures that the transport aircraft can achieve the desired control performance and safe flight capability.

Interconnection and damping assignment passivity‐based control for dynamic steering position stabilization of an underactuated AUV

AbstractSteering motion bestows autonomous underwater vehicles (AUVs) with the agility to navigate intricate paths and trajectories precisely. Ensuring effective steering position stabilization in underwater vehicles is paramount, as it enables precise navigation and enhances safety, efficiency, data accuracy, adaptability to changing conditions, and the overall success of diverse underwater missions. This article addresses the challenging task of steering position stabilization in underactuated AUVs. To achieve this, we employ an interconnection and damping assignment passivity‐based control method to design a control law tailored for steering position stabilization. Our approach considers the nonlinear dynamics of a six‐degrees‐of‐freedom steering motion in AUVs. The control objective involves assigning a suitable energy function and reshaping the interconnection and damping structure to render the closed‐loop system asymptotically stable at the desired equilibrium point. The robustness of our proposed control law is assessed rigorously, subjecting it to modeling uncertainties and underwater disturbances. Our findings are substantiated with simulation results that support the efficacy of the designed control law. Notably, we base our simulations on experimentally validated steering motion parameters obtained from the REMUS 100 AUV, enhancing the real‐world applicability of our research.

Active flutter suppression for light sport aircraft by a control surface split

A new method of active flutter suppression is present in the paper and aims at the Light Sport Aircraft category, where it has never been used, designed, or even considered. The novelty of the method lies in splitting the control surface into a part controlled by a pilot with purely mechanical control and into a part controlled by a servo-actuator with a controller. The control law of the actuator is designed to follow the pilot-controlled part of the control surfaces and damp unstable oscillations if they occur. The controller design for flutter suppression is focused on achieving simple solutions. The request for simplicity is important for easy acquisition of airworthiness during a certification process and easy implementation by producers. The contribution of this paper also lies in the analysis of flutter suppression capability based on the varying active control surface span. The results show that it is not necessary to use the entire area of a control surface for active flutter suppression.A mathematical model based on a real aircraft is developed and verified for the simulation of active flutter suppression. In addition, control law design and simulations of the dynamic response are performed. The robustness of the control law and aircraft controllability in the case of active control surface malfunction is investigated.

Fault-tolerant control of bullet train based on fuzzy adaptive control

Abstract For the trajectory tracking problem of a single-particle train dynamics model under the condition of partial loss of power in the train power unit due to actuator failure during the operation of the EMU, considering the situation where the system exists with uncertain dynamics from the model and unknown external disturbers, a control method based on fuzzy adaptive fault-tolerant control method for EMU is proposed. Under the framework of the backstepping method, the fuzzy system is used to approach the system function, and a fuzzy adaptive controller is designed. It is proved that the designed control law can enable the train system to track the given speed and displacement trajectory under partial power loss. Using the CRH3 train as the research object, the results show that the designed controller can complete the trajectory tracking control task.