Regulation of the longitudinal dynamics of an helicopter: a Liouvillian systems approach

A feedback regulation scheme is presented for a wide range of horizontal and vertical displacement manoeuvres on a simplified longitudinal model of a helicopter system. The approach is based on the "Liouvillian" property of the helicopter model, rather than its differential flatness, thus requiring only a static, though time-varying, state feedback controller which tracks an off-line planned trajectory planning for the attitude angle reference signal computed in terms of the desired horizontal and vertical displacements. The controller performance is evaluated through digital computer simulations which include initial setting errors and an unmodelled mid course wind gust perturbation of significant magnitude.