A robust adaptive terminal sliding mode control for rigid robotic manipulators

In this paper, a robust adaptive terminal sliding mode controller is developed for n-link rigid robotic manipulators with uncertain dynamics. An MIMO terminal sliding mode is defined for the error dynamics of a closed loop robot control system, and an adaptive mechanism is introduced to estimate the unknown parameters of the upper bounds of system uncertainties in the Lyapunov sense. The estimates are then used as controller parameters so that the effects of uncertain dynamics can be eliminated and a finite time error convergence in the terminal sliding mode can be guaranteed. Also, a useful bounded property of the derivative of the inertial matrix is explored, the convergence rate of the terminal sliding variable vector is investigated, and an experiment using a five bar robotic manipulator is carried out in support of the proposed control scheme.