Retrofit fault‐tolerant tracking control design of an unmanned quadrotor helicopter considering actuator dynamics

This paper presents a retrofit fault‐tolerant tracking control (FTTC) design method with application to an unmanned quadrotor helicopter (UQH). The proposed retrofit fault‐tolerant tracking controller is developed to accommodate loss‐of‐effectiveness faults in the actuators of UQH. First, a state feedback tracking controller acting as the normal controller is designed to guarantee the stability and satisfactory performance of UQH in the absence of actuator faults, while actuator dynamics of UQH are also considered in the controller design. Then, a retrofit control mechanism with integration of an adaptive fault estimator and an adaptive fault compensator is devised against the adverse effects of actuator faults. Next, the proposed retrofit FTTC strategy, which is synthesized by the normal controller and an additional reconfigurable fault compensating mechanism, takes over the control of the faulty UQH to asymptotically stabilize the closed‐loop system with an acceptable performance degradation in the presence of actuator faults. Finally, both numerical simulations and practical experiments are conducted in order to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed FTTC methodology on the asymptotic convergence of tracking error for several combinations of loss‐of‐effectiveness faults in actuators.     

Adaptive fault‐tolerant control for feedback linearizable systems with an aircraft application

This paper investigates fault‐tolerant control (FTC) for feedback linearizable systems (FLSs) and its applications. The dynamic effects caused by the actuator faults on the feedback linearized model are firstly analyzed, which reveals that under actuator faults, the control input in the linearized model is affected by uncertain terms. In the framework of model reference control, the first FTC strategy is proposed as a robust controller, which achieves asymptotic tracking control of the FLS under actuator faults. A disadvantage of this strategy is that it relies on explicit information about several parameters in the actuator faults. This requirement is later relaxed by combining the robust FTC strategy with an adaptive technique to generate the adaptive FTC law, which is then improved to alleviate possible chattering of the actuator and estimation drifting of the adaptive parameter. Finally, the proposed FTC strategies are evaluated by reference command tracking control of a pendulum and an air‐breathing hypersonic vehicle under actuator faults. Simulation results demonstrate good tracking performance, which confirms effectiveness of the proposed strategies. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Reliable H∞ control of discrete-time systems against random intermittent faults

A passive fault-tolerant control strategy is proposed for systems subject to a novel kind of intermittent fault, which is described by a Bernoulli distributed random variable. Three cases of fault location are considered, namely, sensor fault, actuator fault, and both sensor and actuator faults. The dynamic feedback controllers are designed not only to stabilise the fault-free system, but also to guarantee an acceptable performance of the faulty system. The robust H_∞ performance index is used to evaluate the effectiveness of the proposed control scheme. In terms of linear matrix inequality, the sufficient conditions of the existence of controllers are given. An illustrative example indicates the effectiveness of the proposed fault-tolerant control method.     

Robust adaptive fault‐tolerant control of uncertain linear systems via sliding‐mode output feedback

This paper is concerned with the robust adaptive fault‐tolerant compensation control problem via sliding‐mode output feedback for uncertain linear systems with actuator faults and exogenous disturbances. Mismatched disturbance attenuation is performed via H_∞ norm minimization. By incorporating the matrix full‐rank factorization technique with sliding surface design successfully, the total failure of certain actuators can be coped with, under the assumption that redundancy is available in the system. Without the need for a fault detection and isolation mechanism, an adaptive sliding mode controller, where the gain of the nonlinear unit vector term is updated automatically to compensate the effects of actuator faults, is designed to guarantee the asymptotic stability and adaptive H_∞ performance of closed‐loop systems. The effectiveness of the proposed design method is illustrated via a B747‐100/200 aircraft model. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Integrated design of robust fault estimation and fault‐tolerant control against simultaneous actuator and sensor faults

This paper investigates the problems of simultaneous actuator and sensor faults estimation, as well as the fault‐tolerant control scheme for a class of linear continuous‐time systems subject to external disturbances. First, the original system is transformed into a singular form by extending the actuator fault and sensor fault to be parts of the new state. Then, a new estimation technique named non‐fragile proportional‐derivative observer is designed for the singular system to achieve simultaneous estimations of states and faults. With the obtained estimations information, an integrated design of the non‐fragile output feedback fault‐tolerant controller is explored to compensate for the effect of faults by stabilizing the closed‐loop system. Finally, a simulation study on a two‐stage chemical reactor with recycle streams is provided to verify the effectiveness of the proposed approach.     

Robust adaptive fault estimation and fault tolerant control for quadrotor attitude systems

ABSTRACT

This paper addresses the problem of fault estimation and fault tolerant control for quadrotor unmanned aerial vehicle. Firstly, a robust adaptive fault estimation observer (AFEO) is proposed to achieve fault estimation of quadrotor with actuator fault in the presence of external disturbances and parameter uncertainties. Furthermore, based on the estimation of fault, a dynamic output feedback fault tolerant controller (DOFFTC) is designed to stabilise the closed-loop system with faults and uncertainties. Sufficient conditions for the existence of both AFEO and DOFFTC are given in terms of linear matrix inequalities. Finally, simulation results are presented to illustrate the effectiveness of the proposed strategy.     

Actuator fault‐tolerant control of ocean surface vessels with input saturation

In this paper, an actuator robust fault‐tolerant control is proposed for ocean surface vessels with parametric uncertainties and unknown disturbances. Using the backstepping technique and Lyapunov synthesis method, the adaptive tracking control is first developed by incorporating the actuator configuration matrix and considering actuator saturation constraints. The changeable actuator configuration matrix caused by rotatable propulsion devices is considered. Next, the actuator fault‐tolerant control is developed for the case when faults occur in propulsion devices of the ocean surface vessel. Rigorous stability analysis is carried out to show that the proposed fault‐tolerant control can guarantee the stability of the closed‐loop system under certain actuator failure. Finally, simulation studies are given to illustrate the effectiveness of the proposed adaptive tracking control and fault‐tolerant control. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Unknown input modeling and robust fault diagnosis using black box observers

A key issue that needs to be addressed while performing fault diagnosis using black box models is that of robustness against abrupt changes in unknown inputs. A fundamental difficulty with the robust FDI design approaches available in the literature is that they require some a priori knowledge of the model for unmeasured disturbances or modeling uncertainty. In this work, we propose a novel approach for modeling abrupt changes in unmeasured disturbances when innovation form of state space model (i.e. black box observer) is used for fault diagnosis. A disturbance coupling matrix is developed using singular value decomposition of the extended observability matrix and further used to formulate a robust fault diagnosis scheme based on generalized likelihood ratio test. The proposed modeling approach does not require any a priori knowledge of how these faults affect the system dynamics. To isolate sensor and actuator biases from step jumps in unmeasured disturbances, a statistically rigorous method is developed for distinguishing between faults modeled using different number of parameters. Simulation studies on a heavy oil fractionator example show that the proposed FDI methodology based on identified models can be used to effectively distinguish between sensor biases, actuator biases and other soft faults caused by changes in unmeasured disturbance variables. The fault tolerant control scheme, which makes use of the proposed robust FDI methodology, gives significantly better control performance than conventional controllers when soft faults occur. The experimental evaluation of the proposed FDI methodology on a laboratory scale stirred tank temperature control set-up corroborates these conclusions.     

A Novel Robust Attitude Control for Quadrotor Aircraft Subject to Actuator Faults and Wind Gusts

A novel robust fault tolerant controller is developed for the problem of attitude control of a quadrotor aircraft in the presence of actuator faults and wind gusts in this paper. Firstly, a dynamical system of the quadrotor taking into account aerodynamical effects induced by lateral wind and actuator faults is considered using the Newton-Euler approach. Then, based on active disturbance rejection control (ADRC), the fault tolerant controller is proposed to recover faulty system and reject perturbations. The developed controller takes wind gusts, actuator faults and measurement noises as total perturbations which are estimated by improved extended state observer (ESO) and compensated by nonlinear feedback control law. So, the developed robust fault tolerant controller can successfully accomplish the tracking of the desired output values. Finally, some simulation studies are given to illustrate the effectiveness of fault recovery of the proposed scheme and also its ability to attenuate external disturbances that are introduced from environmental causes such as wind gusts and measurement noises.      

Multisensor fusion fault tolerant control

In this paper, a multisensor fusion fault tolerant control system with fault detection and identification via set separation is presented. The fault detection and identification unit verifies that for each sensor–estimator combination, the estimation tracking errors lie inside pre-computed sets and discards faulty sensors when their associated estimation tracking errors leave the sets. An active fault tolerant controller is obtained, where the remaining healthy estimates are combined using a technique based on the optimal fusion criterion in the linear minimum-variance sense. The fused estimates are then used to implement a state feedback tracking controller. We ensure closed-loop stability and performance under the occurrence of abrupt sensor faults. Experimental validation, illustrating the multisensor fusion fault tolerant control strategy is included.     

Robust Fault‐Tolerant Control of Launch Vehicle Via GPI Observer and Integral Sliding Mode Control

A robust fault‐tolerant attitude control scheme is proposed for a launch vehicle (LV) in the presence of unknown external disturbances, mismodeling dynamics, actuator faults, and actuator's constraints. The input‐output representation is employed to describe the rotational dynamics of LV rendering three independently decoupled second order single‐input‐single‐output (SISO) systems. In the differential algebraic framework, general proportional integral (GPI) observers are used for the estimations of the states and of the generalized disturbances, which include internal perturbations, external disturbances, and unknown actuator failures. In order to avoid the defects of the conventional sliding surface, a new nonlinear integral sliding manifold is introduced for the robust fault‐tolerant sliding mode controller design. The stability of the GPI observer and that of the closed‐loop system are guaranteed by Lyapunov's indirect and direct methods, respectively. The convincing numerical simulation results demonstrate the proposed control scheme is with high attitude tracking performance in the presence of various disturbances, actuator faults, and actuator constraints.     

Fault diagnosis and accommodation of nonlinear systems based on multiple-model adaptive unscented Kalman filter and switched MPC and H-infinity loop-shaping controller

In this paper, a new active fault tolerant control (AFTC) methodology is proposed based on a state estimation scheme for fault detection and identification (FDI) to deal with the potential problems due to possible fault scenarios. A bank of adaptive unscented Kalman filters (AUKFs) is used as a core of FDI module. The AUKF approach alleviates the inflexibility of the conventional UKF due to constant covariance set up, leading to probable divergence. A fuzzy-based decision making (FDM) algorithm is introduced to diagnose sensor and/or actuator faults. The proposed FDI approach is utilized to recursively correct the measurement vector and the model used for both state estimation and output prediction in a model predictive control (MPC) formulation. Robustness of the proposed FTC system, H_∞ optimal robust controller and MPC are combined via a fuzzy switch that is used for switching between MPC and robust controller such that FTC system is able to maintain the offset free behavior in the face of abrupt changes in model parameters and unmeasured disturbances. This methodology is applied on benchmark three-tank system; the proposed FTC approach facilitates recovery of the closed loop performance after the faults have been isolated leading to an offset free behavior in the presence of sensor/actuator faults that can be either abrupt or drift change in biases. Analysis of the simulation results reveals that the proposed approach provides an effective method for treating faults (biases/drifts in sensors/actuators, changes in model parameters and unmeasured disturbances) under the unified framework of robust fault tolerant control.     

Integrated fault estimation and fault‐tolerant control for stochastic systems with Brownian motions

This paper presents an integrated robust fault estimation and fault‐tolerant control technique for stochastic systems subjected to Brownian parameter perturbations. The augmented system approach, unknown input observer method, and optimization technique are integrated to achieve robust simultaneous estimates of the system states and the means of faults concerned. Meanwhile, a robust fault‐tolerant control strategy is developed by using actuator and sensor signal compensation techniques. Stochastic linear time‐invariant systems, stochastic systems with Lipschitz nonlinear constraint, and stochastic systems with quadratic inner‐bounded nonlinear constraint are respectively investigated, and the corresponding fault‐tolerant control algorithms are addressed. Finally, the effectiveness of the proposed fault‐tolerant control techniques is demonstrated via the drivetrain system of a 4.8 MW benchmark wind turbine, a 3‐tank system, and a numerical nonlinear model.     

Aero‐Engine DCS Fault‐Tolerant Control with Markov Time Delay Based On Augmented Adaptive Sliding Mode Observer

With a focus on aero‐engine distributed control systems (DCSs) with Markov time delay, unknown input disturbance, and sensor and actuator simultaneous faults, a combined fault tolerant algorithm based on the adaptive sliding mode observer is studied. First, an uncertain augmented model of distributed control system is established under the condition of simultaneous sensor and actuator faults, which also considers the influence of the output disturbances. Second, an augmented adaptive sliding mode observer is designed and the linear matrix inequality (LMI) form stability condition of the combined closed‐loop system is deduced. Third, a robust sliding mode fault tolerant controller is designed based on fault estimation of the sliding mode observer, where the theory of predictive control is adopted to suppress the influence of random time delay on system stability. Simulation results indicate that the proposed sliding mode fault tolerant controller can be very effective despite the existence of faults and output disturbances, and is suitable for the simultaneous sensor and actuator faults condition.     

Robust adaptive fault‐tolerant tracking control for uncertain linear systems with time‐varying performance bounds

In this paper, the problem of robust adaptive fault‐tolerant tracking control with time‐varying performance bounds is investigated for a class of linear systems subject to parameter uncertainties, external disturbances and actuator failures. In order to ensure the norm of the tracking error less than the user‐defined time‐varying performance bounds, we propose a new control strategy which is predicated on the generalized restricted potential function. Compared with the existing result, a novel method which provides two design freedoms is developed to reduce the tracking error. According to the online estimation information provided by adaptive mechanism, a fault‐tolerant tracking control method guaranteeing time‐varying performance bounds is developed for robust tracking of reference model. It is shown that the closed‐loop signals are bounded and the tracking error within an a priori given, time‐varying performance bounds. A simulation result is provided to demonstrate the efficacy of the proposed fault‐tolerant tracking control method.     

Fault‐tolerant fusion‐based MPC with sensor recovery for constrained LPV systems

In this paper, we present a robust fault‐tolerant control scheme for constrained multisensor linear parameter‐varying systems, subject to bounded disturbances, that utilises multiple sensor fusion. The closed‐loop scheme consists of a tube model predictive control‐based feedback tracking controller and sensor‐estimate fusion strategy, which allows for the reintegration of previously faulty sensors. The active fault‐tolerant fusion‐based mechanism tracks the healthy‐faulty transitions of suitable residual variables by means of set separation and precomputed transition times. The sensor‐estimate pairings are then reconfigured based on available healthy sensors. Under the proposed scheme, robust preservation of closed‐loop system boundedness is guaranteed for a wide range of sensor fault situations. An example is presented to illustrate the performance of the fault‐tolerant control strategy.     

Observer-based fault tolerant control for a class of nonlinear multi-agent systems with sensor faults

This article focuses on the robust fault tolerant control (FTC) problem for a class of Lipschitz nonlinear multi-agent systems(MASs) subject to sensor faults. Firstly, sensor faults are transformed into actuator faults via introducing a new intermediate auxiliary state variable, and a distributed adaptive fault estimation observer is designed to estimate the state information and the concerned faults by using the relative output estimation error. Then, the sufficient existence conditions for the observer to satisfy the robust performance index are given. Thirdly, based on the results of observer design, a new design method of dynamic output feedback controller is proposed to implement consensus of MASs and ensure the desired disturbance rejection performance. Finally, the simulation results are presented to illustrate the effectiveness of the proposed method.     

Fault tolerant control for singular systems with actuator saturation and nonlinear perturbation

In this paper, the problem of robust fault tolerant control for a class of singular systems subject to both time-varying state-dependent nonlinear perturbation and actuator saturation is investigated. A sufficient condition for the existence of a fixed-gain controller is first proposed which guarantees the regularity, impulse-free and stability of the closed-loop system under all possible faults. An optimization problem with LMI constraints is formulated to determine the largest contractively invariant ellipsoid. An adaptive fault tolerant controller is then developed to compensate for the failure effects on the system by estimating the fault and updating the design parameter matrices online. Both of these two controllers are in the form of a saturation avoidance feedback with the advantage of relatively small actuator capacities compared with the high gain counterpart. An example is included to illustrate the proposed procedures and their effectiveness.