Modeling, Control and Guidance of an Autonomous Wheeled Mobile Robot AWMR: A Comparative Study between Three Yaw Moment Control Techniques for Autopilot Design with Experimental Results

This paper presents the development of an autopilot system for self-driving an autonomous wheeled vehicle. A mathematical model, including the power allocation system, has been designed for a vehicle with three degrees of freedom. All model parameters have been identified through experimental trials. Heading and speed controllers were designed based on Lyapunov theory. These controllers have been further fine-tuned and tested through simulations to verify their robustness against external disturbances in the system dynamics. Moreover, this work proposes guidance approaches that allow the vehicle to track desired waypoints (line of sight (LOS)), and follow a given path (cross-track error) and a predefined trajectory with obstacle avoidance. A comparative study was also proposed in this paper, wherein we evaluate the paths followed by the vehicle using distinct yaw moment control techniques which are; differential thrust controller, solely relying on a steering controller, and a combination of both. To validate the effectiveness of the proposed autopilot system, we have conducted experimental tests, specifically focusing on waypoint tracking control (LOS method). The results underscore the system’s capabilities and its potential in real-world applications.