Semi-active landing gear can provide good performance of both landing impact and taxi situation, and has the ability for adapting to various ground conditions and operational conditions. A kind of Nonlinear Model Predictive Control algorithm （NMPC） for semi-active landing gears is developed in this paper. The NMPC algorithm uses Genetic Algorithm （GA） as the optimization technique and chooses damping performance of landing gear at touch down to be the optimization object. The valve＇s rate and magnitude limitations are also considered in the controller＇s design. A simulation model is built for the semi-active landing gear＇s damping process at touchdown. Drop tests are carried out on an experimental passive landing gear systerm to validate the parameters of the simulation model. The result of numerical simulation shows that the isolation of impact load at touchdown can be significantly improved compared to other control algorithms. The strongly nonlinear dynamics of semi-active landing gear coupled with control valve＇s rate and magnitude limitations are handled well with the proposed controller.
To select or develop an appropriate actuator is one of the key and difficult issues in the study of semi-active controlled landing gear. Performance of the actuator may directly affect the effectiveness of semi-active control. In this article, parallel high-speed solenoid valves are chosen to be the actuators for the semi-active controlled landing gear and being studied. A nonlinear high-speed solenoid valve model is developed with the consideration of magnetic saturation characteristics and verified by test. According to the design rule of keeping the peak load as small as possible while absorbing the specified shock energy, a fuzzy PD control rule is designed. By the rule controller parameters can be self-regulated. The simulation results indicate that the semi-active control based on high-speed solenoid valve can effectively improve the control performance and reduce impact load during landing.
