Robust attitude control of a 3-DOF helicopter considering actuator saturation

• Published in: Mechanical systems and signal processing Vol. 149; p. 107209
• Main Authors: Zhu, Xiaoyuan, Li, Doudou
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Berlin Elsevier Ltd 15.02.2021; Elsevier BV
• Subjects: 3-DOF helicopter; Actuator saturation; Actuators; Attitude control; Comparative experimental tests; Control stability; Control systems design; Controllers; Cost function; Dynamic models; H-infinity control; Helicopter control; Linear matrix inequalities; Linear quadratic regulator; Mathematical analysis; Robust attitude control; Robust control; Saturation; 3-DOF helicopter; Robust attitude control; Comparative experimental tests; Actuator saturation
• ISSN: 0888-3270; 1096-1216
• DOI: 10.1016/j.ymssp.2020.107209

•Actuator saturation is considered in robust controller design of helicopter system.•Two control strategies are used to handle the saturation problem and disturbances.•Based on Quanser’s 3-DOF helicopter platform, experimental tests are conducted. This paper presents a comparative research of robust attitude control for helicopter system. Considering the actuator saturation problem in the controller design process, two control approaches are mainly investigated. A mixed H∞ performance and linear quadratic regulator (LQR) based robust controller is proposed as the first approach, in which the control input is indirectly constrained in the cost function. While a constrained H∞ performance based robust attitude controller is developed as the other approach, in which the actuator saturation problem is directly considered in the dynamical model as well as following controller gain calculation. Based on Lyapunov stability theory, sufficient conditions in terms of linear matrix inequalities (LMI) are given. By using Quanser’s 3-DOF laboratory helicopter platform, comparative simulation and experimental tests are conducted. Payload variation and wind disturbance are all considered in the experimental test. And the results demonstrate the effectiveness as well as different performance of proposed robust attitude controllers.