Aerial refueling multi-UAV variable-structure formation control based on the third-order consistency theory

Aiming at the rendezvous and formation control problems of tanker aircraft and receiver aircraft during autonomous aerial refueling, the desired trajectory and flight control law of tanker aircraft are designed based on the Lyapunov navigation vector field, and the third-order consistency variable-structure formation controller is designed to keep the tanker aircraft and the receiver aircraft in the desired formation. Firstly, the UAV model is established; and the flight control law of the tanker aircraft is designed based on the Lyapunov navigation vector field; then, based on the position and speed information of the tanker aircraft, the third-order consistency formation controller is designed for the receiver aircraft, and combined with the distributed formation method, the variable-structure communication rule is designed in the case of a UAV is crashed within the formation; finally, the simulation proves the validity of the variable-structure formation controller based on the third-order consistency theory.