Modeling, control design, and influence analysis of catapult-assisted take-off process for carrier-based aircrafts

This paper addresses the problems of modeling, control design, and influence analysis of the steam catapult-assisted take-off process of the carrier-based aircrafts. The mathematical models of the carrier-based aircraft, steam catapult, landing gears, and the environmental factors including deck motion and bow airflow have been established to express the aircraft dynamics in the take-off process. An engineering method based automatic flight control system has been designed, which is divided into the longitudinal channel and lateral channel. The influences of the preset control surface, ship deck motion, ship bow airflow, and automatic flight control system system are tested by a series of simulations. The simulation results show that the elevator angle preset is necessary in the stage of accelerated running on the ship deck and the deck motion is the most important factor for safe take-off, while the ship bow airflow is beneficial for climbing up of the aircraft. The automatic flight control system gives the guarantee of safety and performance in the take-off process of the carrier-based aircraft.