Flight Control (2nd Edition)

A special issue of Aerospace (ISSN 2226-4310). This special issue belongs to the section "Aeronautics".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 31 December 2024 | Viewed by 2442

Special Issue Editor


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Guest Editor
Division of Mechanics, Institute of Aeronautics and Applied Mechanics, Faculty of Power and Aeronautical Engineering, Warsaw University of Technology, 00-665 Warsaw, Poland
Interests: flight dynamics; aircraft system identification; optimization methods; modeling and simulation in MATLAB environment
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Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Flight control systems play a vital role in the advancement of modern aircraft, enabling the execution of intended maneuvers and enhancing overall aircraft capabilities. Their complex design necessitates a multidisciplinary approach, encompassing flight mechanics modeling, control theory, mathematical optimization, the analysis of complex aeronautical systems, compliance with aviation regulations, the consideration of pilot input, and various other factors. The integration of these components poses significant challenges and demands considerable time and effort. Consequently, flight control system design remains a dynamic field characterized by ongoing development and innovative breakthroughs. This Special Issue endeavors to showcase the latest progress in flight control design, encompassing such diverse areas as the following:

  • Aerodynamic parameter estimation and modelling;
  • Artificial intelligence and machine learning for aeronautics;
  • Autonomous aircraft and aeronautical systems;
  • Guidance, navigation, and control;
  • Flight tests and instrumentation;
  • Flexible and resilient control systems;
  • Modern flight mechanics;
  • Pilot in the loop modelling and simulation;
  • Risk-based oversight.

Dr. Piotr Lichota
Guest Editor

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Keywords

  • adaptative control
  • autonomous systems
  • guidance, navigation, and control
  • neural networks and machine learning
  • flight dynamics
  • flight testing
  • pilot modelling and human–aircraft interaction
  • reconfigurable and fault-tolerant control
  • risk and safety management
  • system identification

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Related Special Issue

Published Papers (3 papers)

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Research

21 pages, 3386 KiB  
Article
An Advanced Control Method for Aircraft Carrier Landing of UAV Based on CAPF–NMPC
by Danhe Chen, Lingfeng Xu and Chuangge Wang
Aerospace 2024, 11(8), 656; https://doi.org/10.3390/aerospace11080656 - 11 Aug 2024
Viewed by 331
Abstract
This paper investigates a carrier landing controller for unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), and a nonlinear model predictive control (NMPC) approach is proposed considering a precise motion control required under dynamic landing platform and environment disturbances. The NMPC controller adopts constraint aware particle filtering [...] Read more.
This paper investigates a carrier landing controller for unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), and a nonlinear model predictive control (NMPC) approach is proposed considering a precise motion control required under dynamic landing platform and environment disturbances. The NMPC controller adopts constraint aware particle filtering (CAPF) to predict deck positions for disturbance compensation and to solve the nonlinear optimization problem, based on a model establishment of carrier motion and wind field. CAPF leverages Monte Carlo sampling to optimally estimate control variables for improved optimization, while utilizing constraint barrier functions to keep particles within a feasible domain. The controller considers constraints such as fuel optimization, control saturation, and flight safety to achieve trajectory control. The advanced control method enhances the solution, estimating optimal control sequences of UAV and forecasting deck positions within a moving visual field, with effective trajectory tracing and higher control accuracy than traditional methods, while significantly reducing single-step computation time. The simulation is carried out using UAV “Silver Fox”, considering several scenarios of different wind scales compared with traditional CAPF–NMPC and the nlmpc method. The results show that the proposed NMPC approach can effectively reduce control chattering, with a landing error in rough marine environments of around 0.08 m, and demonstrate improvements in trajectory tracking capability, constraint performance and computational efficiency. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Flight Control (2nd Edition))
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29 pages, 7815 KiB  
Article
Enhanced Fuzzy-Based Super-Twisting Sliding-Mode Control System for the Cessna Citation X Lateral Motion
by Seyed Mohammad Hosseini, Ilona Bematol, Georges Ghazi and Ruxandra Mihaela Botez
Aerospace 2024, 11(7), 549; https://doi.org/10.3390/aerospace11070549 - 3 Jul 2024
Viewed by 514
Abstract
A novel combination of three control systems is presented in this paper: an adaptive control system, a type-two fuzzy logic system, and a super-twisting sliding mode control (STSMC) system. This combination was developed at the Laboratory of Applied Research in Active Controls, Avionics [...] Read more.
A novel combination of three control systems is presented in this paper: an adaptive control system, a type-two fuzzy logic system, and a super-twisting sliding mode control (STSMC) system. This combination was developed at the Laboratory of Applied Research in Active Controls, Avionics and AeroServoElasticity (LARCASE). This controller incorporates two methods to calculate the gains of the switching term in the STSMC utilizing the particle swarm optimization algorithm: (1) adaptive gains and (2) optimized gains. This methodology was applied to a nonlinear model of the Cessna Citation X business jet aircraft generated by the simulation platform developed at the LARCASE in Simulink/MATLAB (R2022b) for aircraft lateral motion. The platform was validated with flight data obtained from a Level-D research aircraft flight simulator manufactured by the CAE (Montreal, Canada). Level D denotes the highest qualification that the FAA issues for research flight simulators. The performances of controllers were evaluated using the turbulence generated by the Dryden model. The simulation results show that this controller can address both turbulence and existing uncertainties. Finally, the controller was validated for 925 flight conditions over the whole flight envelope for a single configuration using both adaptive and optimized gains in switching terms of the STSMC. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Flight Control (2nd Edition))
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20 pages, 5077 KiB  
Article
Sliding Mode Flight Control Law Design Requirements for Oblique Wing Aircraft Based on Perturbation Theory
by Lixin Wang, Xun Sun, Hailiang Liu, Jingzhong Ma, Wenyuan Cheng, Shang Tai, Yun Zhu and Ting Yue
Aerospace 2024, 11(5), 366; https://doi.org/10.3390/aerospace11050366 - 6 May 2024
Viewed by 951
Abstract
Flight control law parameters should be designed to provide a sufficient stability margin for closed-loop aircraft while ensuring command tracking accuracy. The singular perturbation margin (SPM) and generalized gain margin (GGM), which are generalizations of the classical phase margin (PM) and gain margin [...] Read more.
Flight control law parameters should be designed to provide a sufficient stability margin for closed-loop aircraft while ensuring command tracking accuracy. The singular perturbation margin (SPM) and generalized gain margin (GGM), which are generalizations of the classical phase margin (PM) and gain margin (GM), respectively, from a linear time-invariant system to a nonlinear time-varying system, can be used to quantitatively characterize the maximum singular perturbation and regular perturbation allowed to maintain system stability. In this paper, the sliding mode flight control structure and the design parameters of the sliding mode control law are first introduced for an oblique wing aircraft (OWA), the SPM-gauge and GGM-gauge are added to this closed-loop aircraft model, and the analytical expressions of the SPM and GGM are derived with respect to the control law parameters. Second, the stability margin design requirements of closed-loop aircraft in flight control system design specifications are converted into limitations on the SPM and GGM to determine the value range of the flight control law parameters. Then, with the goal of reducing the sum of the approaching time and sliding time, the parameter value combination is selected within the control law parameter range that meets the stability margin requirements, thus forming a flight control law design method for OWA during the wing skewing process. Finally, the designed control law parameters are applied to a sample OWA, and the stability margin of closed-loop aircraft during the wing skewing process is verified. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Flight Control (2nd Edition))
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