Disturbance Compensation for Gun Control System
of Tank Based on LADRC
Dongxu ZHU Xiaobo QIU
Department of Control Engineering Department of Control Engineering
Academy of Armored Force Academy of Armored Force
Engineering, AAFE Engineering, AAFE
Beijing, China Beijing, China
zhudongxu198676@163.com qiuxiaobo007@sohu.com
Abstract—Aims at the nonlinearity such as friction and varieties
of system parameters and unmodeled dynamics in azimuth gun
control system of tank, in order to improve the low speed
performance and anti-interference ability, the strategy of
LADRC is proposed. Considering nonlinearity and non-model
dynamics as a composite disturbance, the math model of azimuth
gun control system is established firstly, then the improved
LADRC controller is designed, finally, the method is verified by
simulation. The results show that the method is superior to the
classical PID control. The low speed performance, anti-
interference ability and tracking accuracy of gun control system
are greatly improved. Besides, it also has fast response, simple
parameter adjustment, and only one parameter is adjusted to
obtain good performance. The method provides a new approach
for the controlling problems of tank gun control system.
Keywords-Gun control system; LADRC; ADRC; Disturbance
compensation
I. INTRODUCTION
Tank gun control system is the main instrument to track the
target and control the gun to fire correctly for the fire control
system of tank. The response time and shooting accuracy of
fire control system of tank are highly related with many
parameters of gun control system of tank[1,2]. The non-linear
friction , the parameter drift and the measurement noise
existing in gun control system have serious implications for
stability and accuracy and the low speed servo system
performance, and in the firing process, the disturbances such as
the way spectrum, cross wind, and the vibration of tank
through the friction between the body and the turret of gun
cause stability interference[1-3]. Besides the existing tank Gun
Control Systems are mostly based on the classical theory of
feedback control design of linear time-invariant systems, it can
not overcome the above problems or reach a satisfactory
performance [4]. For the above problems, the articles[5,6]used
model reference adaptive control and sliding mode control
based on Lyapunov stability theory to compensate for
nonlinear friction factor. The article [7] aimed at the drive
time-lapse and impulsion in gun control system of tanks caused
by backlash nonlinearity, analysis and compensation issues are
proposed. However, most of these studies are for a special
nonlinear control, but a real gun control system exists a variety
of nonlinear factors, and its operating mechanism and
978-1-4244-8165-1/11/$26.00 ©2011 IEEE
2198
Xing CHEN
Department of recycling activities and
control
Xi'an Satellite Control Center
Xi'an, China
dongxulover@126.com
mathematical models are different. The design for each phase
of a nonlinear perturbation and the corresponding
compensation controller is difficult to give the overall system
performance a larger increase. Therefore, articles [8][9] use
typical ADRC method[10]for gun control system in the presence
of the friction torque, ring gap, parameter drift, and other non-
linear factors makes the compensation. But in the actual system
implementation process, the typical ADRC method is more
complex and has large computation, making the system control
cycle very long and the control effect reduced; At the same
time, the parameters of ADRC are excessive and there is no
mature adjustment method, making the ADRC's control
performance is limited .
In this paper, for the nonlinear factors existing in the gun
control system, the method based on LADRC compensation
control is proposed, breaking the limitations of conventional
ADRC and obtaining the ideal controller which has simple
algorithm, is easy to adjust and control the quality. The
effectiveness of the control program is simulated by Matlab7.1.
II. TANK GUN CONTROL SYSTEM MODEL
In this paper, the azimuth gun control system of a tank is
taken as an example. This type of tank gun control system uses
the velocity-position double closed loop control (on the
automatic condition). For convenient analysis, only consider
the position loop feedback, and the structure of the system will
be simplified as follows:
θ (t )
u
Figure 1. The block diagram of tank azimuth gun control system
Ignore the impact of the armature inductance, the system
can be simplified to a second-order systems, control systems
create the gun control law through the appropriate decision-
making control computer to calculate the output of a voltage
value that corresponds to the implementation of the motor
speed. After the unit transformation, the control amount of gun
control system is obtained[3]. Where J = 6.572 × 10 -3 kg ⋅ m 2 is
the turret load, turret motors, steering gear (gear) equivalent to
the total motor shaft inertia. Turret motor torque coefficient
is K m = 0 .245 N ⋅ m / A , turret motor back EMF coefficient
 is K e = 0 . 25 V ⋅ s / rad ; armature resistance is R = 0.4Ω ; θ d
θ

transmission ratio is i = 1650 ; Then we can estimate the

amplifier from the static calculations and the accuracy [10], to
take K = 200 . f is external disturbance torque for the Figure 2. Linear ADRC control schematic
system including the friction torque and eccentric torque and so Take second-order nonlinear system for example, the
on. Take the system angular displacement of the motor as the general second-order system can be used the following
state variables x1 = θ ; motor angular velocity as state expression:
variables x 2 = θ . With the turret motor model we can gain: ­ .
°° x. 1 = x 2
di ® x 2 = f ( t , x1 , x 2 , w ) + b 0 u
L = Ku − K e x 2 − Ri °
dt (1) ¯° y = x 1
dx (6)
J 2
= K i + f
dt
m
(2) where f (t , x1 , x 2 , w) is the uncertainty of the system, which
M (x2 ) could be external and internal disturbances, such as frictions,
f
is the friction torque, considering that motor sensor noise, measurement noise, or the variation and
inductance is low, they can be ignored, taking (1) into(2),Gun uncertainties of the plant dynamics. Rewrite (6) as:
Control Systems can be drawn from the state equation: ­ x.
° . 1 = x 2
. ° x = x + b u
x = x ® .
(3)
2 3 0
1 2
° x 3 = h
KmKe KK m 1 ° y = x
x 2 = − x2 + u + f ¯ 1 (7)
JR JR J (4) .
Substituting the data obtained: where x3 = f , h = f . The above equation is equivalent to:
.
ªx º.
x = Ax + Bu + Eh
« 1 » = ª0 1 º ª x1 º ª 0 º ª 0 º
+ u (t ) + « » f
« . » ¬« 0 − 23.3 »¼ «¬ x 2 »¼ «¬18640 »¼ ¬152.16 ¼ y = Cx (8)
¬ x2 ¼
ª x º
where,
y = [1 0 ] «
1
» ª0 1 0º ª 0 º ª0 º
(5) ¬ x ¼
A = «« 0 1 »» , B = «« b 0 »» , C = [1 0 ] , E = «« 0 »»
2

0 0
It can be seen that considering the friction torque existing
«¬ 0 0 0 »¼ «¬ 0 »¼ «¬ 1 »¼
gun control system, parameter drift, non-linear factors, tank
gun control system becomes a second-order time-varying A standard linear observer for (8), can be written as:
nonlinear system and using traditional methods is difficult to .
z = Az + Bu + L ( y − yˆ )
achieve high precision control. yˆ = Cz (9)
where L = [β 1 β 2 β 3 ]T is the observer gain, can be
III. THE GUN CONTROL SYSTEM CONTROLLER DESIGN
obtained by using pole assignment. In order to research the
BASED ON LADRC
relationship between the observer performance
Based on the nonlinear extended state observer (NESO), and β 1 , β 2 , β 3 , making (8) minus (9), we get the error
Active Disturbance Rejection Control (ADRC) offers a new
equation:
and inherently robust controller building block that requires
very little information of the plant, which actively estimates .
(10)
e = A e e + Eh
and compensates for the effects of the unknown dynamics and
external disturbances and internal disturbances in real time, Where e i = x i − z i , i = 1, 2,3 ª− β 1 1 0º
getting a good quality control performance[11]. Although the A e = A − LC = «« − β 2 0 1»
»
«¬ − β 0 0»¼
ADRC control algorithm shows unique advantages in many 3

practical applications, the difficulty in the controller parameters if h is bounded amount, as long as the matrix L made
adjustment of nonlinear function making it subject to the Ae stable (the system observability can guarantee the existence
limitations in the practical applications [12].
of L ), there is, ei → 0 ,the ESO will get well observed effect
A. Design of linear ADRC [12]
.
To simplify the design of ADRC and make it more simple As the observer can observe the uncertainty of the system,
and effective in practical applications, literature [12] proposed with the state observer properly designed, the controller is
a linear active disturbance rejection control (LADRC), and given by
parameterization conception, you can achieve simple parameter − z3 + u0 (11)
u =
setting by setting observer bandwidth, forcing number of b0
adjustable parameters of the extended state observer to one ignoring the observer's estimation error, the plant is reduced to
single adjustable parameter, madding the LADRC method to a unit gain double integrator,
be an easy project implementation control strategy. y = ( f − z 3 ) + u 0 ≈ u 0
(12)
using PD controller can achieve good control effect.

2199
 u 0 = k p (r − z1 ) − k d z 2 in the same simulation environment, the parameters are
(13)
Where r is the specified input, in order to avoid the obtained from the trial and error method[13], the parameter is
introduction of the differential of the specified input, using taken to be K P = 120, K I = 2, K D = 0.9 ; LADRC parameters
− k d z 2 here instead of k d (r − z 2 ) . The linear active are ωo = 300, ωc = ω o / 3, ξ = 1 .In order to study the
disturbance rejection controller can be composed of (9) (11) impact of nonlinear factors to the control quality of the gun
and (13). According to parameterization conception, the control system, proving the validity and accuracy of the
parameters can be selected proposed method, the simulation considers friction LuGre
2 3
k d = 2 ξω c , k p = ω c β1 = 3ωo , β 2 = 3ωo , β 3 = ωo
2
model of various dynamic and static friction characteristicsas
with , .
friction disturbance[14,15]. The friction model parameters
Where ω0 is the observer bandwidth, ωc is the controller
are: σ 0 = 200, σ 1 = 10, σ 2 = 0.03, M c = 10 N ⋅ M
bandwidth, ξ is the damping rate of the desired closed loop.
M s = 15N ⋅ M , vs = 0.01o / s [6].
B. LADRC controller design of azimuth Gun Control System
A. Tracking Simulation
θ d
θ
According to the minimum target rate of low-speed
performance requirements of Gun control
o
system ≤ 0 .0 3 5 / s , the minimum target speed in the article
o
Figure 3.Control schematic of azimuth gun control system based on LADRC is selected as 0 . 0 2 / s . Figure 6 shows the tracking curve
according by (5) in order to make the design of simulation slope of PID control and the control based on LADRC. What
model more realistic, we have chosen b0 = 18700 as the best can be seen is, the speed tracking under the PID control exists
"crawl" problem and there is static error, and LADRC
estimation of b0 . To make LADRC more accurate, we add controller eliminated the low-speed crawling problems of Gun
known knowledge when LESO is designed: Control System and the tracking error. Given a expected
ª − 3ω o 1 0º ª 0 3ω o º signal yd = 0.5sin(πt ) , Figure 7 shows the simulation results
2 ªu º
z = «« − 3ω o − 23 .3 1 »» z + ««18640 3ω o »» « »
2

y of sinusoidal tracking of the gun control system. We can see

¬« − 3ω o
3
0 0 »¼ ¬« 0 ω o 3 ¼» ¬ ¼ that under the frictional disturbance conditions, the
(14)
conventional PID control tracking exists the phenomenon of
Where ω0 is the observer bandwidth, adding the known "flat top" and the presence of delay and large errors, but under
knowledge to the observer design will make the observing the control of LADRC, the delay and the phenomenon of non-
flat are basically eliminated, the tracking accuracy is greatly
results are more accurate [12]. z1 㧘 z 2 㧘 and z 3 are the improved.
estimates of y , y and f respectively. Here, f represents
both the unknown internal dynamics and the external
disturbance of azimuth gun control system. The controller
can be chosen as:
u 0 − z3
u =
18640
u = k p (r − z1 ) − k z
0 d 2
(15)
(a)the low-speed tracking curve of PID control
2
here, kd = 2ξω2 ,ξ = 1, k p = ωc , and ωo = 3 ~ 5ωc .
IV. SIMULATION AND RESULTS
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To verify the control effect of the method based on
LADRC in Gun Control System, we use Matlab7.1-Simulink
to validate it. We use fixed steps of 1ms, with fixed step ode3
algorithm; The system output signal is mixed with 0.1% of
the white noise, whose sampling time is 1ms; To show the (c) the low-speed tracking error under the control of LADRC
advantages of this method, it is compared with the PID method Figure 4. Slope tracking simulation results

2200

(a) the simulation results of sinusoidal tracking under PID control
(b)the curve of sinusoidal tracking under the control of LADRC
(c)the sinusoidal tracking error under the control of LADRC
Figure 5. Gun Control System Location Tracking simulation results.
B. Simulation of the immunity
Tank is easy to be influenced by the road spectrum, cross
wind, vibration and other disturbances in itself during firing,
probably 15 N ⋅ M .These disturbances have a serious impact
on the fire through the friction between the turret and the body
on the turret and guns. In this paper, the outside anti-
interference ability of LRADC is shown in Figure 7.The results
show that LADRC method can estimate the transformation of
disturbance and compensation in real time and make the
immunity of the system greatly improved to the traditional PID
control method, almost free from disturbances, and it can get
the steady-state value in a very short period of time. It shows
that the system is robust and adapted to disturbances , given the
peak of the disturbance of the system M fs = 15 N ⋅ M ,as
shown in Figure 8 - (a) below.
(a)the system given disturbance
(b)curve of PID immunity response
2201
(c) curve LADRC immunity response
Figure 6. The simulation results of system disturbance rejection
CONCLUSION
the nonlinear factors, existing in azimuth gun control
system of tank, is the main factors to affect the performance of
gun control system, resulting in creeping phenomenon and the
speed fluctuations and poor tracking accuracy, etc. This article
focuses on designing LADRC control strategy based on
classical ADRC control strategy, simplifying the difficulty of
design and the difficulty of parameter adjustment. The
simulation can be seen that using LADRC controller, compared
with the traditional PID controller, can improve the tracking
accuracy of gun control system, obtain good robustness,
overcome the phenomenon of low-speed crawling, and
improve immunity greatly. The method provides a new design
way of Gun Control System.
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