Tuning and miniaturization of active vibration controllers of a fixed-wing composite aircraft drone using the experiment-on-the-loop system

Active vibration control (AVC) in Unmanned Air Vehicles (UAV) enhances flight stability, enables lighter and more efficient designs, and improves fuel efficiency and payload capacity. However, AVC systems require careful design, and this study demonstrates how they can be efficiently tuned on a fixed-wing, composite aircraft drone using a purely experimental approach, leveraging the newly developed Experiment-in-the-Loop (EITL) method. The EITL is a real-time optimizer, capable of autonomously running hundreds or thousands of experimental tests on a target structure. In each test, the EITL iteratively refines the control parameters, progressively improving their performance. The EITL offers the advantage of being fast, tuning the controllers within hours, and not relying on numerical models. In this paper, 9 AVC systems are tuned, including four Positive Position Feedback (PPFs) controllers and five higher-order controllers. Experimental results show that these controllers reduce vibrations on the composite aircraft drone by an average of 55 % over 7 resonant modes in the frequency range from 0 to 250 Hz. In addition, results show how AVC systems can be practically implemented using lightweight hardware. The developed scaled-down AVC system weighs 183.8 g and occupies 273.5 cm³, making it a promising solution for onboard UAV applications.