Longitudinal Robust Stability Augmentation for Micro Air Vehicle Design and Validation

This paper presents a robust fixed order H₂ controller designed using Strengthened discrete optimal projection equations (SDOPEs), which approximate the first order necessary optimality condition. The novelty of this work is the application of the robust H₂ controller to a micro aerial vehicle MAV, named Sarika2 developed in house. The controller is designed in discrete domain for the longitudinal dynamics of Sarika2 in the presence of low frequency atmospheric turbulence (gust) and high frequency sensor noise. The design specification includes simultaneous stabilization, disturbance rejection and noise attenuation over the entire flight envelope of the vehicle. Six degrees of freedom nonlinear equations are linearized, and validated using nonlinear simulation model and is used for the controller design. The resulting controller performance is comprehensively analyzed by means of linear and nonlinear simulation.