Fault Tolerant Control of an Octoplane UAV Using Sliding Mode Methods

İbrahim Mızrak

doi:10.56753/ASREL.2025.2.2

İbrahim Mızrak, Halim Alwi, Christopher Edwards

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DOI : 10.56753/ASREL.2025.2.2

This article presents a Fault Tolerant Control (FTC) scheme for an octoplane UAV, a fixed-wing unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) equipped with eight vertical rotors, using sliding mode control (SMC) allocation. The proposed approach requires the design of only a single baseline controller that is effective under fault-free and fault/failure scenarios. The octoplane, a hybrid dual-system UAV (a fixed-wing aircraft with vertical takeoff and landing (VTOL) capabilities), presents unique challenges and opportunities due to its actuator redundancy. The scheme fully exploits the octoplane’s redundant vertical rotors and additional control surfaces, including the elevator, rudder, and independently operated ailerons, to manage total actuator faults/failures during cruise flight. The approach utilises sliding mode control with a control allocation (CA) strategy to redistribute control signals in the case of actuator failure. Simulation results based on a nonlinear model of the octoplane are presented at the end of the article to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed scheme. The paper commences with an introduction that includes a general review of the SMC Method and dual-system UAVs, specifically an octoplane configuration, highlighting the significance of FTC in improving UAV stability and the benefits of including extra actuator redundancy in the FTC design. The paper then presents an analysis of the equations of motion for an octoplane UAV, setting the foundation for examining the FTC of cruise mode. Subsequently, it introduces the SMC design process and explains its implementation of FTC. In cruise mode, the proposed SMC-CA method exhibits no performance degradation in the event of fault/failure compared to fault-free cases. The scheme demonstrates the effective combination of CA and SMC methods to an octoplane UAV during cruise flight.

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Fault Tolerant Control of an Octoplane UAV Using Sliding Mode Methods, Research Article,

Received : 19.08.2025, Accepted : 25.08.2025 , Published Online : 25.08.2025