Nonlinear Missile Autopilot Design: Performance and Optimization

Modern nonlinear control methods have by now developed to the point that several of them have the potential of becoming "plug and play" methods for missile autopilot design. This report introduces a selection of methods that are promising candidates for automated design, including MIMO/block backstepping, State Dependent Riccati Equation, Successive Galerkin Approximation and Two Timescale Separation. After a general discussion on the missile autopilot control problem and governing equations, the methods and their basic ideas are summarized. All the methods discussed are illustrated using simulations, the majority of which have been performed in the TURBOSIMECS missile simulation environment developed at FOI. Some interesting observations are also presented, in particular for the MIMO/block backstepping approach.