Robust and Efficient Autopilot control Laws design

Abstract

This document contains a description of the REAL project (Robust and Efficient Autopilot Control Laws design). The project was carried out in the fourth Framework Program of the Commission of the European Communities (CEC). A detailed description of the technical achievements is given in the Final Technical Report [FTROl]. Exploitation and dissemination aspects are treated in more detail in the Exploitation Report [EROl]. In the REAL project, it was investigated how modem robust control design methods may improve the efficiency of the autopilot design process. First the current industrial autopilot design process was described and potentials for improvement were identified. Then two separate design teams each developed a control laws design process, using modem robust control methods and automation concepts. With these processes, each team designed autoland control laws for two benchmark problems: • The RealCAM benchmark, which was used to set up the process and to demonstrate the robustness of the designs. For the robustness assessment, EADS Toulouse's certification tool SIMPA (Simulation Pilote Automatique) was used. • The ReaiATTAS benchmark, which was used to demonstrate the efficiency of the design process and to demonstrate that the resulting control laws can be implemented into realtime flight computers. This was proven by flight tests on DLR's flying testbed ATTAS. Industry evaluated the controller performance concerning robustness and the efficiency potential of the proposed design procedures. A main resuU is that both investigated robust design methods have proven to be very powerful in designing realistic robust controllers for an autoland system of a civil aircraft and have good potential for industrial application