Adaptive Closed-Loop Control Allocation-Based Fault Tolerant Flight Control for an Overactuated Aircraft

This paper discusses the adaptive control allocation based fault tolerant flight control problem for an overactuated aircraft in the presence of unknown uncertainties and actuator faults. Inspired by the feedback of control moments, an innovative adaptive closed-loop control allocation scheme with an estimator for the uncertainties is designed to tackle the distinct non-monotonic and the coupled nonlinearity caused by actuator failures or faults. Furthermore, since actuator faults will cause difficulty in modeling the aircraft dynamics precisely, an adaptive super twisting sliding mode controller is developed to track the reference trajectory. The convergence of the adaptive closed-loop control allocation and the stability of the fault tolerant flight control system is analyzed. Simulation results indicate the effectiveness and performance of the developed controller.