Modelling and control of a small-scale unmanned helicopter

• Published in: Proceedings of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers. Part I, Journal of systems and control engineering Vol. 222; no. 6; pp. 481 - 492
• Main Authors: Du, J F, Kondak, K, Zhang, Y O, Lu, T S
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: London, England SAGE Publications 01.09.2008; SAGE PUBLICATIONS, INC
• Subjects: Algorithms; Control systems; Dynamic inversion; Flight simulation; Helicopters; Mathematical models; Mechanical engineering; Predictive control; Real time; Research methodology; Rigid structures; Rigid-body dynamics; Scale (ratio); Tracking; Trajectories; Unmanned aerial vehicles; Unmanned helicopters; MPC; Kane's equation; helicopter; flight control
• ISSN: 0959-6518; 2041-3041
• DOI: 10.1243/09596518JSCE550

The dynamical model of a toy helicopter considered as two rigid bodies is deduced using Kane's equation. Another model is presented that considers the helicopter as a single rigid body. It is shown that the response of the rotational dynamics modelled as two rigid bodies is cosine while that modelled as one rigid body is linear. In addition, a flight controller is presented that is based on dynamic inversion and model predictive control (MPC). In order to decrease the online computational effort associated with a conventional model predictive controller, an explicit MPC algorithm is introduced, which converts the online computations to offline computations to solve the real-time problem. Experimental results show that the controller is able to operate in real-time and can closely track the trajectory without overshoot.