Fault-Tolerant Fixed-Time Super Twisting Control for Quadrotors with Disturbances

This paper proposes a sliding mode control (SMC) approach with a fixed-time super-twisting reaching law (FxSTRL) for quadrotor systems subjected to uncertainties and disturbances. The proposed SMC scheme utilizes a super-twisting reaching law to ensure convergence to the sliding surface within a fixed time independently of initial conditions, enhancing the robustness and transient performance of the control system. The proposed control rule effectively eliminates the chattering issue associated with SMC and exhibits robust control performance in the presence of actuator faults. The proposed method underwent comprehensive simulation evaluations to assess its trajectory-tracking performance under various conditions, including both the presence and absence of actuator faults. The simulations compared the proposed method's performance against existing control approaches, namely classical SMC. In conclusion, the proposed FxSTRL-based sliding mode controller offers a novel robust control strategy that effectively handles actuator faults, and reduces chattering.