Formation Control Method of High Speed Aircraft Considering Natural Velocity Attenuation

In order to solve the problem of formation control of unpowered high speed aircraft, a method of formation control of high speed aircraft based on backstepping sliding mode control is proposed considering the natural speed attenuation of the aircraft affected by air resistance. The lift force is decomposed in altitude and side, and combined with the definition of lift-drag ratio, the formation flight model of high-speed aircraft is established in ballistic coordinate system. After that, the controller design is divided into lateral position tracking subsystem, course position coordination subsystem and altitude limiting subsystem, and the formation controller is designed by backstepping control theory, sliding mode control theory and hysteresis control theory. The simulation results show that the formation control method designed in this paper can ensure that the transverse position of each aircraft converges to the expected value, the heading position tends to be the same, and the height fluctuates within a certain range centered on the expected value, which effectively solves the formation maintenance and formation switching problems of high-speed aircraft under the condition of uncontrollable speed.