ACS6110

Lab Report Briefing

Jan 2015

Introduction
This document contains a set of questions designed to assess your knowledge of the modelling,
simulation and control aspects of this course. You are required to prepare a short lab report that
answers each of the questions below, and submit a hard-copy to ACSE reception no later than 4pm
on Friday February 6th. You may not collaborate with other students.

Questions
1. The motion about the pitch axis on most of the helicopters displays a damped oscillatory response. Briefly explain the physical source of this response. You may wish to refer to Figure 1.
(10 marks)
2. List five ways in which the dynamics of your S IMULINK model of the helicopter hardware
differs from the dynamics of the actual hardware. (10 marks)
3. Select two of the differences listed in your answer to the question above and briefly describe
how you would model these phenomena for inclusion in your S IMULINK model of the helicopter hardware. (10 marks)
4. As part of your lab exercises, you were asked to note the value of the constant input voltage Ue
required to initiate a response about the elevation axis. What value of Ue did you obtain in
simulation, and what value was required on your actual hardware? These values are unlikely
to have been identical. Briefly explain the reason for this discrepancy. (10 marks)
5. If the modelled value of Ue does not precisely match the actual value of Ue , the helicopter will
not achieve hover in the horizontal position under the action of an open-loop controller. Briefly
explain how you would design a feedback controller to achieve horizontal hover assuming
your modelled value of Ue is different from the actual value of Ue . (10 marks)
6. Using your L AB VIEW open-loop controller, determine a pair of fan voltages required to make
the helicopter hover in an approximately steady state (dont worry about achieving perfect
stabilisation). Place one hand close to the underside of one of the fans. What do you notice?
Briefly explain this effect? (10 marks)
7. If a pitch angle sensor was not available to measure the pitch angle, would you still be able to
use a full state feedback controller? Briefly explain your answer. (10 marks)
8. Write down your final design values for Qx and Qu , the state and control penalty matrices used
in the design of your LQR controller. Briefly explain your reasons for selecting these values. (10
marks)
9. Provide plots of your simulated closed-loop controller response. Specifically, provide the following:
1

Figure 1: Photo of the pitch-beam sub-assembly, showing (1) the fan wires emerging from a hollow
brass insert, and (2) miniature ball-bearings.

A plot of reference and output elevation angles against time,

A plot of reference and output travel angles against time,
A plot of the pitch angle against time,
A plot of the control signal Ua,b against time.
You may wish to refer to the plots at the end of Lecture 6 to see examples of these plots. Now
imagine you are presenting your controller to the manufacturers of the helicopter hardware,
with a view to licensing it, and making a small fortune in the process. The manufacturers
obviously need some convincing that your controller is worthy of investment. Referring to
your plotted responses and in fewer than 100 words, explain the performance of your helicopter
in terms of how it responds to changes in reference inputs. (20 marks)