Roll-Pitch-Yaw Integrated H∞ Controller Synthesis for High Angle-of-Attack Missiles

In this work, we explore the feasibility of roll-pitch-yaw integrated autopilots for high angle-of-attack missiles. An investigation of the aerodynamic characteristics of a surface-to-air missile is presented, which reveals the strong effects of cross coupling between the longitudinal and lateral dynamics. Robust control techniques based on $H_{\infty}$ synthesis are employed to design roll-pitch-yaw integrated autopilots. The performance of the proposed roll-pitch-yaw integrated controller is tested in high-fidelity nonlinear five-degree-of-freedom simulations accounting for kinematic cross-coupling effects between the lateral and longitudinal channels. Against nonlinearity and cross-coupling effects of the missile dynamics, the integrated controller demonstrates superior performance when compared with the controller designed in a decoupled manner.