Force and moment blending control for agile dual missiles

This paper presents a force and moment blending control scheme for a dual-controlled missile with tail fins and reaction jets, which is especially aimed at a fast response. A dual missile can be controlled by forces and moments independently, when the reaction jet is located in front of the center of gravity of the missile. Controlling the net force of aerodynamic lift and jet thrust yields much a faster response compared with controlling the net moment, but it uses large control efforts caused by divergence of angle of attack, especially the jet thrust. Here, force control is implemented by using sliding mode control. Large input usage is alleviated by shaping angle of attack. The proposed blending scheme begins with force control and then makes a transition to moment control. Both control strategies are demonstrated by a nonlinear missile system. The smooth transition from force control to moment control is demonstrated. The proposed approach shows a very fast response, while its input usage is almost same as the conventional moment control.