Adaptive Trajectory Tracking Control of Unmanned Autonomous Helicopters with Parameter Uncertainties and Disturbances for Geophysical Survey

In this paper, trajectory tracking control for autonomous helicopters, which are designed for aeromagnetic survey, is investigated. Since magnetometers towed to the helicopters receive better signals, we consider an unmanned autonomous helicopter with towed unknown slung load, which result in time-varying external disturbances exerting on both thrusts and control torques. Besides, inertial parameters in the helicopter model and external disturbances are also allowed to be unknown. An adaptive filtered backstepping control algorithm is presented. The effects of parameter uncertainties and external disturbances are compensated by introducing additional estimates of their bounds in control laws and robust terms in parameter update laws. It is shown that the proposed control scheme can achieve the ultimate bounded tracking effectively.