NASA 1996 SBIR Phase I

PROJECT TITLE : Multipurpose Advance Tilt Rotor Control System Design using Model Predictive Control

TECHNICAL ABSTRACT (LIMIT 200 WORDS)

The design of control systems for advanced tilt rotor aircraft can be divided into two major areas: the first, and by far the most important, is the stability and control of the aircraft including the rigid blade behavior of the two rotor systems; and the second concerns the fuselage vibrations over the flight envelop. The primary focus of Phase I investigation is to demonstrate the feasibility of designing a robust flight control system for the rigid body modes using Model Predictive Control (MPC) design approach. Phase II effort will extend this approach to fuselage vibration control using transfer functions at rotor blade harmonics. Over the last two decades starting with the pioneering work of Richalet et. al (1976) in France and Culter et. al (1980) in USA, great progress has been made in the development of Model Predictive Control (MPC) methods for optimal control of nonlinear uncertain dynamic systems under hard constraints on inputs and outputs.

Applications of MPC to aerospace and defense problems were pioneered by Scientific Systems and are receiving increasing attention with the availability of low cost high speed chips and processors (Mehra et. al (1977, 1980)). Phase I will involve the following specific tasks: Task 1: Acquisition of math models, real time simulation and control requirements from BHTI. Task 2: Design and development of a Model Predictive controller (MPC). Task 3: MPC Controller tuning and testing. Task 4: Hardware/Software Implementation Requirements. Task 5: Reports, meetings and Phase II Recommendations.

MPC methodology is very general and is finding increasing applications in all areas of control. Commercial applications of MPC exist in chemical, automotive, power generation, pulp and paper, manufacturing and metal processing industries.

Dr. Raman K. Mehra
Scientific Systems Company, Inc.
500 West Cummings Park Suite 3000
Woburn, MA 01801

Scientific Systems Company, Inc.
500 West Cummings Park Suite 3000
Woburn, MA 01801