Longitudinal control of unmanned powered parafoil with precise control gain

Abstract

Unmanned powered parafoil is a complex nonlinear system. In this paper, a novel approach based on active disturbance rejection control (ADRC) with precise control gain is constructed for unmanned powered parafoil to reach the precise reference altitude. We first outline the dynamic model of unmanned powered parafoil. Moreover, the longitudinal altitude controller is introduced, where the extended state observer (ESO) estimates the total disturbances involving model uncertainties, internal coupling and external wind disturbance. Furthermore, the highlight of paper, is that the control gain is directly obtained from the system model rather than a trial value, which can optimize the state error feedback (SEF) and enhance the stability and disturbance-rejection of the controller. After that, the introduction of semi-physical platform is presented and the experimental results are analyzed. The experiment results verify the efficiency of this control approach.