Data-driven robust MPC of tiltwing VTOL aircraft

TL;DR

This paper presents a data-driven robust tube-based Model Predictive Control approach for tiltwing VTOL aircraft, effectively handling wind disturbances and model uncertainties through DC decomposition for computational tractability.

Contribution

It introduces a novel data-driven robust MPC method using DC decomposition to manage uncertainties in tiltwing VTOL aircraft control.

Findings

Successfully handles wind gust disturbances in simulations

Demonstrates computational efficiency of the proposed approach

Enhances robustness of VTOL control under uncertain conditions

Abstract

This paper investigates robust tube-based Model Predictive Control (MPC) of a tiltwing Vertical Take-Off and Landing (VTOL) aircraft subject to wind disturbances and model uncertainty. Our approach is based on a Difference of Convex (DC) function decomposition of the dynamics to develop a computationally tractable optimisation with robust tubes for the system trajectories. We consider a case study of a VTOL aircraft subject to wind gusts and whose aerodynamics is defined from data.