Fault tolerant control strategy based on actuation switch mechanism for more-electric aircraft with vertical tail damage

This paper proposes a fault tolerant control strategy with an actuation switch mechanism for different degrees of vertical tail damage of more-electric aircraft (MEA). A damage degree coefficient of vertical tail is introduced and the relationship between lateral derivatives and damage degree is formulated. Benefit from the more-electric characteristics, a combination of electro-hydrostatic actuation (EHA) system and engine differential thrust is proposed for serious vertical tail damage to regain lateral-directional stability and manoeuvrability. Furthermore, the reconfigurable control law is carried out by the model reference control (MRC) combined with linear quadratic regulator (LQR). Simulation results with the NASA generic transportation model (GTM) demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed control strategy for the damaged aircraft.