Baseline Flight Control System Design for an Unmanned Flutter Demonstrator

A comprehensive design of the baseline control and navigation system for a single-jet-engined flutter demonstrator aircraft is presented in this paper. To facilitate the design task, a classical cascaded flight control structure is selected. Advanced robust control techniques are used to design and tune the individual feedback loops of the control system. Therefore, the design problems are posted as multi-objective non-linear optimization problems which are solved using non-smooth optimization techniques. The developed control system enables augmented and fully automated flights. The availability of a high-fidelity non-linear simulator allows the assessment of the flight controller performance and robustness. The control system is verified in realistic simulation scenarios along the test pattern defined for the real flight test campaign.