Formation Control of Multiple Underactuated Surface Vessels with a Disturbance Observer

To maintain the formation of underactuated surface vessels (USVs), this study designs a formation controller based on a virtual structure strategy. The problem of formation control is transformed into the problems of tracking the USV position and the virtual structure point position. Meanwhile, to eliminate the effects of model parameter uncertainties and external environment disturbances on USV tracking control, a compensation control algorithm based on disturbance estimation is proposed. The Lyapunov theorem is introduced to ensure that the trajectory tracking error of the proposed control algorithm eventually converges to any small region, which confirms global stability of the designed tracking error. The simulation results demonstrate that the proposed controller can eliminate the effect of external uncertain interference and maintain the formation of multiple USVs.

Automated summary

This study designs a formation controller based on a virtual structure strategy to maintain the formation of underactuated surface vessels (USVs). It proposes a compensation control algorithm based on disturbance estimation to eliminate the effects of model parameter uncertainties and external environment disturbances on USV tracking control. The simulation results demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed controller in eliminating external uncertain interference and maintaining the formation of multiple USVs.