Positioning of Large Surface Vessels using Multiple Tugboats

摘要

In this paper, the positioning of large surface vessels using multiple, autonomous tugboats is investigated. Specifically, the paper investigates the development of two control strategies: (1) an adaptive position controller that compensates for select system parameters such as mass and drag coefficients and also for an unknown thrust configuration matrix that is the result of unknown tugboat locations and (2) a robust position control strategy that does not require transmission of information between the tugs. The control design for (2) is facilitated by strategic placement of the tugs about the vessel hull such that the resulting thrust matrix is upper triangular. Performance of both controllers is investigated by simulations for a scaled model of a surface vessel.