Smooth switching linear parameter-varying control for hypersonic vehicles via a parameter set automatic partition method

This study presents a systematic approach to design smooth switching linear parameter-varying (LPV) controllers for hypersonic vehicles (HVs). Considering the switched LPV model of HVs, the smooth switching controllers are designed by means of dividing the scheduling parameter set into subsets with overlaps and the controllers in the overlapped subsets are smoothly scheduled between controllers in adjacent subsets. A switching law without constraint on average dwell time is obtained which makes the conclusion less conservative. To divide the parameter set automatically, a novel set partition method, in which the selecting of datum vertex and the handling of unpartitioned subset are innovative, is proposed. The switching LPV controllers that achieve a desired performance are constructed efficiently by solving a convex optimisation problem. Simulation results for HVs demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed smooth switching LPV controllers and parameter set division method.