Integrated strategy for commercial aircraft fault-tolerant control

A new integrated strategy of fault-tolerant control for linear systems with actuator faults and disturbances is proposed. The presented approach is to design the fault estimation and reconfigurable control together, using a multiple-model-based adaptive unknown input observer and model reference adaptive control method. The simulation and comparison of the longitudinal attitude control for a commercial aircraft B747-200 model show that the proposed integrated design approach leads to ideal FE and RC performances. It was noted that it is important to employ anti-windup techniques when designing FTC controllers in the real world because the magnitude of control surface deflections is physically constrained.