An Adaptive Fault Tolerant Control Method for Electromagnetic Formation Spacecraft with External Disturbances

Fault-tolerant control (FTC) is an essential consideration for the reason that the proper functioning of electromagnetic formation spacecraft (EMFS) actuators are challenged by the harsh space environment. An Integral-Type Sliding Mode Control (ISMC) scheme is proposed for actuator faults and external disturbances (AFED) caused by coil failure and external complex environment of EMFS system. Before the system state reaches the sliding mode surface, we use super-twisting algorithm to accelerate the reaching of the sliding mode surface and reduce the chattering. After reaching the sliding surface, a novel nominal proportional passive controller is proposed that integrates a damping term, thereby enhance system robustness and expediting system stabilization. Moreover, the FTC method proposed incorporates adaptive techniques to handle unknown AFED in real-time while ensuring system stability. This paper proposes a new adaptive FTC method that enhances the actuator’s capability without requiring controller reconfiguration. Simulation results illustrate the effectiveness of this method for suppressing AFED in harsh space environment.