The flying of aircraft information necessitates the extension of the theory of formation flight control to allow for three dimensional formation maneuvers. A leader and wingman formation is considered. A rotating reference frame attached to the wingman is used and special attention is given to the motion of the leader relative to the wingman. A thirteen state, three inputs, and three disturbances signal control system which models the dynamics of a two aircraft formation in three dimensional spaces is developed. The theory of formation control was applied to KC-130J tanker and F-16 receiver configuration to study the availability of performing such mission on a large scale. Three formation flight control concepts are investigated. A proportional, integral, and derivative automatic control system to maintain the wing aircraft in the specified formation geometry despite the leader’s maneuvers is designed, and its performance is examined in simulation experiments. By adding special compensation to each control law to maintain the design damping ratio and gain margin, it is possible to reach the desired performance satisfying the predefined relative distances boundaries.
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