Sliding Mode Control Based Design for a 6-DOF Miniature Helicopter In Hovering Flight Mode

Unmanned helicopters are an excellent choice as an unmanned aerial vehicle for distinct applications, owing to its several advantages over other fixed wing and rotary wing vehicles. Considering all the flight modes of an unmanned helicopter, hovering for an extended period is one of the important flight regimes in the practical scenario. Unmanned helicopters are prone to external disturbances like wind gusts during its flight so a robust controller is necessary for the unmanned operation. A robust sliding mode controller can be adequately designed and implemented to maintain the unmanned helicopter in hovering flight mode. In this paper a sliding mode control based control law is designed for the unmanned helicopter to maintain it in the hover flight even in the presence of external disturbance. The performance of the designed controller is validated with the simulation results.