Adaptive Position Tracking Controller for the Flapping Wing Micro Aerial Vehicle

The flapping-wing micro aerial vehicle (FWMAV) represents an important direction in the development of aircraft, and the performance of its position tracking control is a critical factor in its development. The FWMAV position-tracking-control problem is studied, and an adaptive controller for position tracking control is proposed, which can solve the singular state problem with zero theoretical error. Specifically, a zero-gradient position controller has been proposed, but theoretical analysis reveals that it has limitations in solving the position-tracking-control problem. We report the existence of a theoretical position-tracking error for the controller, for which a theoretical analysis is provided. To remedy this weakness, an adaptive controller that has zero theoretical tracking error is proposed, which uses a nonlinear activation function to accelerate the convergence speed. Simulation results are presented, which verify the superiority of the proposed controller.