Nominal Model-Based Backstepping and Sliding Mode Control for Deep-sea Mining Vehicle

Aiming at improving the accuracy together with the adaptability of the tracking controller, the paper proposes a control method combining the Extended Kalman Filter (EKF) and Nominal Model-Based Backstepping and Sliding Mode Control (NM-BSMC). The backstepping controller is designed for the nominal model, and the uncertain part of the actual system is compensated by the sliding mode controller, so that the robust control of the uncertain system can be achieved.

In addition, EKF is used to estimate the road resistance coefficients, which strengthens the controller adaptability to uncertain conditions. The proposed method is verified by a hardware-in-the-loop experimental environment with seabed conditions. The experiment results show that the proposed NM-BSMC can adapt to the unstructured environment precisely and achieve a good tracking performance as well as strong robustness.