Nearly time-optimal point to point navigation control design for power wheelchair dynamics

This paper focused on discrete time and nearly time-optimal point to point navigation control of an autonomous power wheelchair. Nonlinear system dynamics is modeled and a discrete time PI type controller with disturbance input decoupler (DID) is designed. The linear and angular velocities are generated by a particular nearly time optimal command generator algorithm in which only one co-state equation needs to be integrated forward with time while the others are constants. The wheelchair is directly driven by two independent brushless direct current (BLDC) motors mounted to the rear left and right wheels. Whole system with the guidance and control algorithms is simulated and the results are presented