ISA Transactions 53 (2014) 1350–1356

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ISA Transactions
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/isatrans

Research Article

Second order sliding mode control for a quadrotor UAV

En-Hui Zheng a, Jing-Jing Xiong a,n, Ji-Liang Luo b
a
College of Mechanical and Electrical Engineering, China Jiliang University, Hangzhou 310018, PR China
b
College of Information Science and Engineering, Huaqiao University, Xiamen 361021, PR China

art ic l e i nf o a b s t r a c t

Article history: A method based on second order sliding mode control (2-SMC) is proposed to design controllers for a
Received 17 January 2014 small quadrotor UAV. For the switching sliding manifold design, the selection of the coefficients of the
Received in revised form switching sliding manifold is in general a sophisticated issue because the coefficients are nonlinear. In
8 March 2014
this work, in order to perform the position and attitude tracking control of the quadrotor perfectly, the
Accepted 27 March 2014
dynamical model of the quadrotor is divided into two subsystems, i.e., a fully actuated subsystem and an
Available online 18 April 2014
This paper was recommended for publica- underactuated subsystem. For the former, a sliding manifold is defined by combining the position and
tion by Dr. Jeff Pieper velocity tracking errors of one state variable, i.e., the sliding manifold has two coefficients. For the latter,
a sliding manifold is constructed via a linear combination of position and velocity tracking errors of two
Keywords: state variables, i.e., the sliding manifold has four coefficients. In order to further obtain the nonlinear
Quadrotor UAV
coefficients of the sliding manifold, Hurwitz stability analysis is used to the solving process. In addition,
Second order sliding mode control
the flight controllers are derived by using Lyapunov theory, which guarantees that all system state
Lyapunov theory
Hurwitz stability trajectories reach and stay on the sliding surfaces. Extensive simulation results are given to illustrate the
effectiveness of the proposed control method.
& 2014 ISA. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction and right propellers so eliminating any reactive torque around

More recently, a growing interest in Unmanned Aerial Vehicles
(UAVs) has been shown among the research community, including
industry, government and academia [1–6]. This popularity may
be owed to the ability to effectively carry out a wide range of
applications such as, search and rescue missions, wild fire surveil-
lance, law enforcement, mapping, aerial cinematography, power
plants inspection, etc. [5]. The possibility of removing human
pilots from danger as well as the size and cost of unmanned
aircraft are indeed very attractive but have to be compared to the
performances obtained by conventional manned aircraft in terms
of mission capabilities, efficiency and flexibility [6].
The quadrotor UAV is a four-rotor Vertical Take-Off and Landing
(VTOL) aircraft, which has all advantages of VTOL aircraft along
with an increased payload capability, a stability in hover inherent
to its design as well as an increased maneuverability. Furthermore,
its most important advantage when compared to conventional
aircraft, is its reduced mechanical complexity. Nowadays, the
emerging and existing motions of the quadrotor UAV include:
(a) the precession motion, however, neutralized by designing the
front and rear rotors to spin in the opposite direction to the left
n
Corresponding author.
E-mail addresses: ehzheng@cjlu.edu.cn (E.-H. Zheng),
jjxiong357@gmail.com (J.-J. Xiong), jlluo@hqu.edu.cn (J.-L. Luo).
the vertical coordinate axis; (b) the hover motion, obtained by
making the rotational velocity of each propellers same; (c) the roll
and pitch motion, attained by applying a difference of rotational
velocity between the opposing rotors forcing the vehicle to tilt
towards the slowest propeller; (d) the yaw motion, generated
by making the rotational velocity of neighboring rotors diffe-
rent from others thus forcing the vehicle to tilt towards the two
slower propellers; (e) the vertical motion, acquired by increasing
or decreasing the rotational velocity of all rotors by the same
account; (f) the horizonal motion, gotten by making the vehicle
roll or pitch firstly, so as to shift the direction of the thrust vector
and then produce a forward component [6].
In this work, the position and attitude tracking control of
a small quadrotor UAV is considered. In practical missions, the
stability of the aircraft is easily affected by abruptly changed
commands. The flight controller design capable of offering to the
aircraft an accurate and robust control is crucial in the flight
process.
Many extended SMC methods have been proposed for the flight
controller design for the quadrotor aircraft [7–12]. In [7], a robust
second order sliding mode controller for the attitude stabilization
of a four rotor helicopter (commonly known as quadrotor) to
overcome the chattering phenomena in classical (first) sliding
mode control, while preserving the invariance property of sliding
mode, was proposed. A SMC approach was proposed to stabilize a
class of underactuated systems which were in cascaded form [8],

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.isatra.2014.03.010
0019-0578/& 2014 ISA. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
 E.-H. Zheng et al. / ISA Transactions 53 (2014) 1350–1356 1351

where the dynamical model of a quadrotor helicopter was taken as F3

an example for illustrating the proposed SMC. The use of those F4
SMC strategies in the works is dictated by a necessity to compen-
sate for the external disturbances. In addition, in order to illustrate
the robustness of the control algorithm, the wind regarded as a
B
specific disturbance has been taken into account the flight process
of the quadrotor [6,13]. A second-order sliding mode control z
(2-SMC) was proposed for second-order uncertain plants using ψ F2
equivalent approach to improve the performance of control F1 O y
systems in [14]. An adaptive second order sliding mode (SOSM) θ
x
controller with a nonlinear sliding surface was proposed in [15]. f ms g
However, in the most of existing literatures and research efforts on
the control of the quadrotor UAVs, the coefficients of the defined ey
E
sliding manifolds are taken as special values and given directly
in the simulations. In order to further explore the information
about the characteristic of those coefficients, the condition of O
Hurwitz stability can be used to calculate the coefficients of sliding ex
ez
manifolds.
Combining with the characteristics of 2-SMC, meanwhile, it is Fig. 1. Quadrotor aircraft.
to obtain the good performance of tracking control of the quad-
rotor aircraft, the dynamics model is decomposed into the two
subsystems. For the fully actuated subsystem in the 2-SMC, it is represent the roll, the pitch and the yaw, respectively. Those
straightforward to conclude the convergence of the state variables angles are bounded as follows: roll angle, ϕ, by ð  π=2 o
from the linear switching surfaces when the state trajectories are ϕ oπ=2Þ; pitch angle, θ, by ð π=2 o θ o π=2Þ; and yaw angle,
in their linear sliding surfaces, but, for the underactuated sub- ψ, by ð  π oψ o πÞ. The rotation of the quadrotor's body must
system, the linear sliding manifolds are not applicable because the be compensated during position control. The compensation is
system has fewer inputs than the independent variables to be attained by using the transpose of the rotation matrix
controlled, as a result, a nonlinear sliding manifold or in general an
R ¼ Rðϕ; θ; ψÞ ¼ Rðz; ψ ÞRðy; θÞRðx; ϕÞ
internal dynamics must be stabilized by the proper selection of the 2 3
switching sliding manifold coefficients [16]. The SMC along with a cos ψ  sin ψ 0
6 7
linear switching surface was proposed for similar underactuated Rðz; ψÞ ¼ 4 sin ψ cos ψ 0 5;
system [16,17]. The linear sliding manifold is constructed by 0 0 1
combining the position and velocity tracking errors of the two 2 3
cos θ 0 sin θ
states of the underactuated subsystem in a linear form, which 6 7
Rðy; θÞ ¼ 4 0 1 0 5;
brings four coefficients associated with the four state variables.
The 2-SMC law is derived by using Lyapunov theory, which gua-  sin θ 0 cos θ
2 3
rantees the subsystem is stable. In the sliding mode, the sliding 1 0 0
motion lies on the four coefficients, but, in a complex and highly 6 cos ϕ  sin ϕ 7
Rðx; ϕÞ ¼ 4 0 5: ð1Þ
nonlinear form. Therefore, it is difficult to directly choose the 0 sin ϕ cos ϕ
coefficients to obtain the desired sliding motion. To simplify the
switching surface design, the nonlinear sliding manifold is linear- The kinematic equations of rotational and translation move-
ized around the desired equilibrium points, the nonlinear coeffi- ments are obtained by means of the rotation matrix. The transla-
cients are calculated by Hurwitz stability. The linearized switching tional kinematic is written as
manifold is equivalent to a normal linear system that is under a
ve ¼ R U vB ð2Þ
full state linear feedback control, through a mathematical trans-
0 0
formation [17]. where ve ¼ ½u0 ; v0 ; w0  and vB ¼ ½ub ; vb ; wb  are linear velocities
The rest of this paper is organized as follows. In Section 2 of the mass center expressed in the earth-frame and body-frame,
the dynamical model of the quadrotor is given. The problem is respectively.
formulated in Section 3. The quadrotor flight controller design The rotational kinematics is obtained from the relationship
based on 2-SMC is shown in Section 4. The simulation results and between the rotation matrix and its derivative with a skew-
conclusions are presented in Sections 5 and 6, respectively. symmetric matrix [6,18,19] as follows:

Φ_ ¼ Η  1Ω
2_3 2 32 3
2. Quadrotor dynamical model ϕ 1 sin ϕ tan θ cos ϕ tan θ p
6 θ_ 7 6 0 cos ϕ  sin ϕ 7 6 7
4 5¼4 54 q 5 ð3Þ
The quadrotor aircraft is detailedly illustrated in Fig. 1. Its ψ_ 0 sin ϕ sec θ cos ϕ sec θ r
dynamical model is set up by the body-frame B(Oxyz) and the
earth-frame e(Oxyz). Let a vector ½x; y; z0 denote the position of where Φ ¼ ½ϕ; θ; ψ0 , and Ω ¼ ½p; q; r0 are the angular velocities in
the center of the gravity of the quadrotor in the earth-frame while the body-frame.
the vector ½u; v; w0 denotes its linear velocity in the earth-frame The translational movement is expressed by the following
and the vector ½p; q; r0 represents its angular velocity in the body- equation [19,20]:
frame ms represents the total mass of the aircraft g denotes the
ms P€ þms Rj;3 ¼ f ð4Þ
acceleration of gravity l denotes the distance from the center of
each rotor to the center of gravity. where P ¼ ½x; y; z0 , and f ¼ Rj;3 Uu1 þ a represents the translational
The orientation of the aircraft is given by the rotation matrix R: force applied to the quadrotor due to the main control input u1 in
e-B, where R depends on the three Euler angles ½ϕ; θ; ψ 0 , which _ K 3 U z_ 0 represents the air
the z-axis direction, and a ¼ ½K 1 U x_ ; K 2 U y;
1352 E.-H. Zheng et al. / ISA Transactions 53 (2014) 1350–1356

drag vector, distributed in the ex, ey and ez axis, respectively. the state-space form is derived by
term Rj;3 represents the third column of the rotation matrix. 8
ϕ€ ¼ qr y Ix z þ IJxr qΩr þ Ilx u2  KIx4 lp
I I
Substituting the state vector P into the Eq. (4), we have >
>
>
<
8 _
θ€ ¼ pr Iz  Ix Jr K5l
I y  I y pΩr þ I y u3  I y q
l
ð15Þ
>
> x€ ¼ m1s ð cos ϕ sin θ cos ψ þ sin ϕ sin ψÞu1  Km1sx >
>
>
< >
: I I
_ ψ€ ¼ pq x Iz y þ ICz u4  KIz6 r
y€ ¼ m1s ð cos ϕ sin θ sin ψ  sin ϕ cos ψÞu1  m2s
K y
ð5Þ
>
>
>
: z€ ¼ 1 ð cos ϕ cos θÞu  g  K 3 z_ where Ki are the drag coefficients and positive constant,
ms 1 ms
Ωr ¼  Ω1 þ Ω2  Ω3 þ Ω4 , Ωr is the overall residual rotor angular
Considering that the quadrotor aircraft is a rigid body and velocity, while Ωi correspond to the rotor's angular velocities.
symmetry, the rotational kinetic equation is expressed by

d
ðJΩÞ ¼ M
dt
where J ¼diag ½I x ; I y ; I z  denotes the inertia matrix of the quad-
rotor, I x ; I y and I z denote the inertias of the quadrotor, M represents
the total torque. The torques of the quadrotor are mainly provided
by the thrust generated by four rotors.
The thrust generated by rotor i is given by
F i ¼ bΩi 2
The reactive torque caused by the rotor drag generated by rotor i,
in free air, is
M i ¼  kΩ2i
where k 4 0 and b4 0 are two parameters depending on the density
of air, the radius of the propeller, the number of blades and the
geometry, lift and drag coefficients of the blade [6,21].
The rolling torque is given by
ð6Þ 3. Control problem formulation
The control problem considered in this work is to preform
asymptotic position and attitude tracking of the quadrotor by
designing flight controllers depended on second order sliding
mode technique. That's, under the controllers, P-P d and Φ-Φd .
Based on the dynamical model in Eqs. (3), (5), and (15), the
control system is divided into multiple subsystems (fully actuated
ð7Þ subsystem composed of z€ and ψ, € underactuated subsystem made
€ and θ)
up of x€ , y€ , ϕ € that is inspired by the sliding mode control
approach [8,22]. For the fully actuated subsystem (or the under-
actuated subsystem), a switching sliding surface is constructed
ð8Þ using a linear combination of position and velocity tracking errors
of one (or two) state variable(s), the tacking errors are driven to
zero in order to achieve the desired output tracking performance,
performed by an independent controller.

M ϕ ¼ lð F 2 þ F 4 Þ ð9Þ 4. Flight controller design

The pitching torque is given by This section mainly introduces the second order sliding mode
control (2-SMC) method that is applied here to design the flight
M θ ¼ lðF 1  F 3 Þ ð10Þ
controller of the quadrotor as shown in Fig. 2.
The yawing torque generated by the four rotors is

M ψ ¼ CðF 1  F 2 þ F 3  F 4 Þ ð11Þ 4.1. Controller design for fully actuated subsystem

where C is the proportional coefficient. A controller for the fully actuated subsystem of the quadrotor is
The gyroscopic torque additively caused by the motor rotor and designed by using 2-SMC. The objective is to ensure that the state
the propeller is given by variables ½z; ψ converge to the desired values ½zd ; ψ d . In addition,
considering that the quadrotor is a rigid-body, according to the
M g ¼ ΣΩ  H i ð12Þ
symmetry, I x ¼ I y is got.
where Hi is the rotational momentum moment, and it only The sliding manifolds are defined as
appears in z-axis due to the angular velocity when the motor s1 ¼ cz ðzd  zÞ þ ðz_ d  z_ Þ ð16aÞ
rotates. Thereafter, the rotational momentum moment meets
H i ¼ ½0; 0; J r Ωi 0 , where Jr denotes the inertia of the z-axis.
According to the above expressions, the total torque is .
_ z z
2 3 zd + Altitude u1
Mϕ
controller
6 7 .
M ¼ M g þ 4 Mθ 5 ð13Þ ψ ψ Fully
_ actuated
Mψ subsystem
ψd + Yaw
angle
The control inputs are calculated as: controller u4
.
2 3 2 T 3 2 32 2 3
θ θ
u1 b b b b Ω1 _ Quadrotor
6 u2 7 66
7 6
7 07
6 27
Ω xd θd + u3 aircraft
76 2 7
6
M Pitch
6 7 6 lb 0  lb
7¼6
ϕ
6 7¼6 6 7 7 ð14Þ angle
4 u3 5 4 M θ 75 4 0  lb 0 lb 56 27
4 Ω3 5 . _
controller

Mψ Ω24
x x Under-
u4 k k k k actuated
y y. _ subsystem
Roll
where u1 denotes the total thrust on the body in the z-axis; u2 and yd f d + angle
controller
u2
u3 represent the roll and pitch torques, respectively; and u4 _ .
represents a yawing torque. f f
€ θ;
Invoking Eqs. (6), (13), and (14), let ½ϕ; € ψ
€ 0 ¼ ½p;
_ q_ ; r_ 0 , and the
air drag is also taken into account, therefore, the second order Fig. 2. The flight control architecture.
 E.-H. Zheng et al. / ISA Transactions 53 (2014) 1350–1356 1353

s2 ¼ cψ ðψ d ψ Þ þ ðψ_ d  ψÞ
_ ð16bÞ 4.3. Switching surface coefficients

where the coefficients cz ; cψ 4 0.

Considering that the coefficients of the sliding manifolds s3 and
By making s_ i ¼  εi sgnðsi Þ  ηi si (i¼1, 2), the corresponding
s4 are obtained using the same condition on Hurwitz stability, the
control laws are designed
following solving process of the coefficients ci (i¼1, 2, 3, 4) is taken
cz ðz_ d  z_ Þ þ z€ d þ g þ d1 þ ε1 sgnðs1 Þ þ η1 s1 as an example for avoiding to repeat the same steps.
u 1 ¼ ms U ð17aÞ
cos ϕ cos θ Let s_ 3 ¼ 0. Replacing u3 with θ in Eq. (19a) yields
c1 c2 c4
Iz θ€ d  θ€ ¼  ðx€ d  x€ Þ  ðx_ d  x_ Þ  ðθ_ d  θÞ
_ ð23Þ
u4 ¼ ½cψ ðψ_ d  ψ_ Þ þ ψ€ d þ d2 þ ε2 sgnðs2 Þ þ η2 s2  ð17bÞ c3 c3 c3
C
When s3 ¼ 0,
where the coefficients of the exponential approach laws ε1 ; ε2 ;
c2 c3 _  c4 ðθd  θÞ;
η1 ; η2 4 0 d1 ¼ K 3 z_ =ms and d2 ¼ K 6 r=I z are taken as x_ d  x_ ¼  ðx xÞ  ðθ_ d  θÞ
c1 d c1 c1
disturbance terms. 2
€θd  θ€ ¼  c1 ðx€ d  x€ Þ þ c2 ðxd xÞ
c3 c c
  1 3
4.2. Controller design for underactuated subsystem c2 c4 _
þ  _ þ c2 c4 ðθd  θÞ
ðθd  θÞ ð24Þ
c1 c3 c1 c3
In this section, a controller for the underactuated subsystem of
the quadrotor is design by using 2-SMC. The objective is to Let y1 ¼ θd  θ, y2 ¼ θ_ d  θ,
_ y3 ¼ xd  x. The cascaded form is

guarantee the state variables [x; θ] and [y; ϕ] converge to the obtained
desired values [xd ; θd ] and [yd ; ϕd ], respectively. y_ 1 ¼ y2 ;
The sliding manifolds are defined as [17] c1 c2
y_ 2 ¼  ðx€  x€ Þ þ 2 ðxd  xÞ
c3 d c1 c3
s3 ¼ c1 ðx_ d  x_ Þ þ c2 ðxd xÞ þ c3 ðθ_ d  θÞ
_ þ c4 ðθd  θÞ ð18aÞ  
c2 c4 _ _ þ c2 c4 ðθd  θÞ;
þ  ðθd  θÞ
_ d  ϕÞ
_ þc8 ðϕd  ϕÞ c1 c3 c1 c3
s4 ¼ c5 ðy_ d  y_ Þ þ c6 ðyd  yÞ þ c7 ðϕ ð18bÞ
c c _  c4 ðθd  θÞ:
_y3 ¼  2 ðxd  xÞ  3 ðθ_ d  θÞ ð25Þ
where the coefficients ci (i¼1,…,8) will be obtained latter from the c1 c1 c1
Hurwitz stability analysis.
When the state variables are close to their equilibrium points,
The time derivatives of the two sliding manifolds are obtained _ θ_ d , x-xd , x_ -x_ d , thus, y1 -0, y2 -0, y3 -0. After the
i.e., θ-θd ; θ-
s_ 3 ¼ c1 ðx€ d  x€ Þ þ c2 ðx_ d  x_ Þ þ c3 ðθ€ d  θÞ
€ þ c4 ðθ_ d  θÞ
_ ð19aÞ linearization around the equilibrium points, the new cascaded
form is obtained
€ d  ϕÞ
s_ 4 ¼ c5 ðy€ d  y€ Þ þ c6 ðy_ d  y_ Þ þ c7 ðϕ € þc8 ðϕ
_ d  ϕÞ
_ ð19bÞ y_ 1 ¼ y2 ;
c1 u1
By making s_ i ¼  εi sgnðsi Þ  ηi si (i¼3, 4), the corresponding y_ 2 ¼  ½x€ d  ð  y1 cos ϕ cos ψ þ sin ϕ sin ψÞ þ d1 
c3 ms
control laws are designed  
c2 2 c2 c4 _ _ þ c2 c4 ðθd  θÞ
  þ ðxd  xÞ þ  ðθd  θÞ
I y c1 c2 c4 _ þ d3 þ 1 ½ε3 sgnðs3 Þ þ η3 s3  c 1 c3 c1 c3 c1 c3
u3 ¼ ðx€ d  x€ Þ þ ðx_ d  x_ Þ þ θ€ d þ ðθ_ d  θÞ
l c3 c3 c3 c3 þξ1 y1 þξ2 y2 þξ3 y3 ;
ð20aÞ c2 c3 _  c4 ðθd  θÞ:
y_ 3 ¼  ðxd  xÞ  ðθ_ d  θÞ ð26Þ
  c1 c1 c1
I x c5 c6 c8 _ þ d4 þ 1 ½ε4 sgnðs4 Þ þ η4 s4 
u2 ¼ ðy€ d  y€ Þ þ ðy_ d  y_ Þ þ ϕ€ d þ ðϕ_ d  ϕÞ Let Y ¼ ½y1 y2 y3 0 , the matrix form is Y_ ¼ AY þ BY,
l c7 c7 c7 c7
2 3 2 3
ð20bÞ 0 1 0 0 0 0
6 7 6 7
A ¼ 4 A21 A22 A23 5 and B ¼ 4 ξ1 ξ2 ξ3 5:
where the coefficients of the exponential approach laws
ε3 ; ε4 ; η3 ; η4 4 0. In addition, the disturbance terms are a b c 0 0 0

d3 ¼  prðI z  I x Þ=I y þ J r pΩr =I y þ K 5 lq=I y and The parameters ξi (i¼1, 2, 3) are small constant,λlef t ðAÞ denotes the
real part of the leftmost eigenvalues of the matrix A in the negative
d4 ¼  qrðI y  I z Þ=I x  J r qΩr =I x þ K 4 lp=I x half plane, when λlef t ðAÞ{0, i.e., the matrix A is Hurwitz, the system
is asymptotically stable near the equilibrium points [8,17]. Thereafter,
Theorem. Considering the dynamical model of the quad -rotor, the it is only necessary to consider the stability of Y_ ¼ AY.
flight controller is designed as the Eqs. (17a), (17b), (20a) and (20b). Assuming c1 a 0, c3 a 0, the parameters are obtained
Under the designed controllers, the nonlinear system is stable. c 1 u1 c2 c4 c2 c4
A21 ¼  cos ϕ cos ψ þ ; A22 ¼  ;
c 3 ms c1 c3 c1 c3
Proof. Consider the Lyapunov function candidates: c2 c4 c3 c2
A23 ¼ 2 ; a ¼  ; b ¼  ; c¼ 
V i ¼ 12 s2i ði ¼ 1; 2; 3; 4Þ ð21Þ c1 c3 c1 c1 c1
 
 λ 1 0 
 
 
Invoking the Eqs. (16a) and (17a), (16b) and (17b), (19a) and Let jλ I  Aj ¼ 0 ; i:e:;   A21 λ  A22  A23  ¼ 0:
 
(20a), (19b) and (20b), the time derivatives of Vi are  a b λc 
V_ i ¼ si U s_ i ¼  εi jsi j  ηi s2i r0 ð22Þ The equation form is expressed
λ  ðA22 þ cÞλ2 þ ðcA22  A21 bA23 Þλ þ cA21  aA23 ¼ 0
3
ð27Þ
Thus, under the control laws ui(i¼1, 2, 3, 4), all the system state
Let the characteristic equation be
trajectories can reach, and thereafter, stay on the corresponding
sliding surfaces, respectively. □ ðλ þ1Þðλ þ 2Þðλ þ 3Þ ¼ 0 ð28Þ
1354 E.-H. Zheng et al. / ISA Transactions 53 (2014) 1350–1356

After the comparison above two equations, the coefficients ci (i¼1, Table 2
2, 3, 4) are obtained Controller parameters.
8 c4
>
> ¼6 Variables Values Variables Values
< cc3 u
c3 ms cos ϕ cos ψ ¼ 11 : ð29Þ
1 1

> cz 1 cψ 1
>
: c2 u1 cos ϕ cos ψ ¼ 6 ε1 0.8 ε2 0.8
c 3 ms
η1 2 η2 2
c1 11ms =ðu1 cos ϕ cos ψÞ c5  11ms =ðu1 cos ψ Þ
Let c3 ¼ 1 then c1 ¼ 11 ms =ðu1 cos ϕ cos ψÞ; c2 6ms =ðu1 cos ϕ cos ψÞ c6  6ms =ðu1 cos ψ Þ
c2 ¼ 6ms =ðu1 cos ϕ cos ψÞ; c4 ¼ 6: c3 1 c7 1
c4 6 c8 6
ε1 0.5 ε4 0.5
Note. The deviation terms ξi caused by the linearization around η3 5 η4 5
the state equilibrium points will bring uncertain deviations to the
coefficient of u1 in the first equation of (5). However, it is overcome
by the switching gain of the SMC laws (20a).

Similarly, the coefficients ci (i¼ 5, 6, 7, 8) are obtained through

0.8
the same idea. Here it is simplified, and they are c5 ¼ 11ms =
ðu1 cos ψ Þ, c6 ¼  6ms =ðu1 cos ψÞ, c7 ¼ 1, c8 ¼ 6. 0.6

z (m)
0.4
5. Simulation results
0.2

The proposed control method has been tested by the following 0

simulations in order to verify the validity and efficiency of the 0.8
0.6 0.8
control scheme utilized in this work, including the performance 0.4 0.6
0.4
attained for the position and attitude tracking problem. Besides, y (m 0.2 0.2
) )
simulations have been carried out with the more accurate model,
0 0 x (m
i.e., the combination of Eqs. (3), (5), (14) and (15), which emulates Fig. 3. Quadrotor's path in set-point position and angle control.
a real quadrotor UAV. In addition, the aerodynamic forces and
moments, and air drag are taken as external disturbances to
demonstrate the robustness of the flight controller designed by 0.9

using second order sliding mode technique.

The simulations are performed on MATLAB7.1.0.246/Simulink, 0.6
x (m)

which is equipped with a computer consisting of a DUO E7200

2.53 GHz CPU with 2 GB of RAM and a 100 GB solid state disk 0.3
drive.
The initial position and angle values of the quadrotor for 0
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80
simulation tests are [0, 0, 0] m and [0, 0, 0] rad. In addition, the 0.9
quadrotor's model variables are listed in Table 1 [23]. Besides, the
controller parameters are listed in Table 2. The simulations results 0.6
are shown in Figs. 3–9.
y (m)

The quaudrotor's path, shown in Fig. 3, is performed under the 0.3

condition of set-point position and angle control. More specifically,
in different moment, the different reference positions and angles 0
are listed in Table 3. 0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80
Even though the reference position and angle were changed in 0.9
every moment, the proposed control scheme managed to effec-
0.6
tively hold the quadrotor's position and attitude in finite-time,
z (m)

as shown in Figs. 4 and 5. It is shown that even though the 0.3

quadrotor's position and attitude are affected by the abruptly
0
changed reference positions and angles, the controller is able to
-0.3
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80
Table 1
T (s)
Quadrotor model parameters.
Fig. 4. The positions (x, y, z).
Variables Values Units

ms 1.1 kg drive all these state variables back to the new reference position
l 0.21 m and angle within seconds. Moreover, the aerodynamic forces and
lx ¼ ly 1.22 Ns2/rad moments, and air drag are taken into account the controller
lz 2.2 Ns2/rad
design. Those demonstrate the robustness of the designed con-
lr 0.2 Ns2/rad
Ki (i¼ 1, 2, 3) 0.1 Ns/m troller and effectiveness of the proposed control scheme.
Ki (i¼ 4, 5, 6) 0.12 Ns/m The linear and angular velocities, shown in Figs. 6 and 7,
g 9.81 m/s2 respectively, exhibit the same behavior as the homologous posi-
b 5 Ns2 tions and angles. Simultaneously, it is also shown that these state
k 2 N/ms2
C 1
variables have coupling relationship, thus verifies the highly-
coupled characteristic of the dynamical model of the quadrotor.
 E.-H. Zheng et al. / ISA Transactions 53 (2014) 1350–1356 1355

0.04 0.4
φ (rad)

s1
0

-0.04 -0.4
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80
0.04 0.3
θ (rad)

s2
0

-0.04 -0.3
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80
1 0.3

0.5

s3
0
ψ (rad)

0
-0.3
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80
-0.5 0.3
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80
T (s)

s4
0
Fig. 5. The angles (ϕ, θ, ψ,).
-0.3
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80
0.25 T (s)

Fig. 8. The sliding variables (s1, s2, s3, s4).

u (m/s)

13
-0.25
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 X: 20.54 X: 66.94
u1 (N)

Y: 10.79 Y: 10.79
0.3 11
v (m/s)

0 9
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80
8
-0.3
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80
u2 (N)

0
0.5
w (m/s)

-8
0 0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80
8
-0.5
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80
u3 (N)

0
T (s)

Fig. 6. The linear velocities (u, v, w).

-8
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80
0.15 4
p (rad/s)

u4 (N)

0
0

-0.15
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 -4
0.15 0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80
T (s)
q (rad/s)

0
Fig. 9. The controllers (u1, u2, u3, u4).

-0.15
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80
0.4 The behavior of the sliding variables, shown in Fig. 8, follows
the expectations as all these variables converge to their sliding
r (rad/s)

0 surfaces. In addition, the convergence time of s1 and s2 is obviously

faster than the convergence time of s3 and s4. Moreover, the
-0.4 position and velocity tracking errors of the system state vari-
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80
ables are perfectly explained by the fluctuations of these sliding
T (s)
variables.
Fig. 7. The angular velocities (p, q, r). Finally, the controllers, displayed in Fig. 9, are continuous as
desired and easily applied to a real-life model. It is noted that
As desired, these state variables are driven to their reference/ although the controllers reach their steady states several times
steady values. This, once again, demonstrates the effectiveness of during the flight process, the stability of them or the quadrotor
the proposed control scheme. does not appear affected. In order to further verify that the real
1356 E.-H. Zheng et al. / ISA Transactions 53 (2014) 1350–1356

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