Flight Control System for a Computer Controlled Aircraft with Limited Sensors.

reportActive / Technical Report | Accession Number: ADA155107 | Open PDF

Abstract:

The Department of Electrical Engineering at the United States Air Force Academy is attempting, through one of its senior design courses, to design, build, and fly a computer controlled aircraft. The Department of Aeronautics was asked to help design the flight control system to be implemented by the on-board digital computer. The project involved building and testing a wind tunnel model of the aircraft to determine its aerodynamic characteristics, performing mass tests on the actual aircraft to determine inertia characteristics, developing a 12 degree-of-freedom nonlinear aircraft simulation computer program, and designing the actual flight control system. This report describes only the last task. A complete flight control system for a small computer controlled aircraft was designed using only yaw rate, heading, lateral load factor, airspeed, altitude, and rate of climb feedback. This multi-input multi-output control problem was done using the classical root locus technique on a linearized system model. The simulation results revealed surprisingly good performance, considering the limitation on sensors. Additional keywords charts Fortran equations of motion kinematic equations.

Author(s):
Webb, T. P.
Author Organization(s):
AIR FORCE ACADEMY CO
Descriptive Note:
Technical note,
Pagination:
0063

Security Markings

DOCUMENT & CONTEXTUAL SUMMARY

Distribution:
Approved For Public Release

RECORD

Collection: TR
Identifying Numbers
Report Number(s):
USAFA-TN-85-4
 Subject Terms
Joint Capability Areas:
JCA_5_Command and Control; JCA_6_Net Centric; JCA_6.4.1_Secure Information Exchange; JCA_3.2_Engagement; JCA_3_Force Application
Communities of Interest:
Air Platforms
Descriptor(s):
*FLIGHT CONTROL SYSTEMS, *FEEDBACK, KINEMATICS, INPUT, OUTPUT, CONTROL, SIMULATION, LOAD DISTRIBUTION, YAW, INERTIA, EQUATIONS OF MOTION, DETECTORS, AIRCRAFT, COMPUTER AIDED DESIGN, MODELS, RATES, INPUT OUTPUT PROCESSING, FORTRAN, LIMITATIONS, LINEARITY, AERODYNAMIC CHARACTERISTICS, AIRSPEED, MULTIPROCESSORS, EQUATIONS, ALTITUDE, ONBOARD, FLIGHT LOADS, DIGITAL COMPUTERS, MULTIPLE OPERATION, ELECTRICAL ENGINEERING, LOCUS, CLIMBING, RATE OF CLIMB INDICATORS
Field(s)/Group(s):
Flight Control and Instrumentation, Computer Programming and Software, Computer Hardware
Keyword(s):
Root locus technique, Digital control
Report Date:
1985 Apr 30