Preliminary Experiments in Model-Based Thruster Control for Underwater Vehicle Positioning

This paper reports comparative experiments with two novel and one conventional thrust control algorithms for the unsteady (transient) control of thrust generated by conventional bladedpropeller marine thrusters. First, comparative experiments with three different thrust control algorithms over a wide range of unsteady operating conditions suggest that model-based control algorithms offer transient thrust-control performance superior to that of their non-model-based counterpart. Second, hybrid simulations combining actual real-time experimental thruster responses with simulated one dimensional real-time vehicle dynamics suggest that modelbased thrust control algorithms offer vehicle position control superior to that of its non-model-based counterpart.