Composite Adaptive Super-Twisting Sliding Mode Control Using Barrier Function for PM Motor Drives Toward Electric Aircraft Applications

To realize stable flight of electricaircraft in complex environments, this article investigates the composite adaptive super-twisting sliding mode (ASTSM) controller for permanent magnet (PM) motor drives utilized in aircraft electrical subsystems. In purpose of enhancing the flight control accuracy of electric aircraft, the large speed fluctuation and poor robustness existing in PM motor drive system have become the primary issues to be addressed. Distinct from the conventional super-twisting sliding mode controller that utilizes the conservative control gain to improve the performance of suppressing disturbance, the proposed barrier function based ASTSM control scheme can adjust the controller gain online according to the actual requirements. By utilizing the characteristics of the barrier function, the motor speed tracking error can be guaranteed to converge within a predefined region. In addition, the augmented input–output model based observer is adopted to compensate for the total disturbance, thereby enhancing the robustness of the electric aircraft flight control system. On this basis, the PM motor drive system can achieve satisfactory disturbance rejection ability without sacrificing its steady-state performance. Representative experimental results demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed control approach.