Parameter adaptive based neural network sliding mode control for electro‐hydraulic system with application to rock drilling jumbo

Summary Rock drilling jumbo is an important large construction machine used for tunneling construction, and its automation has an urgent demand in engineering. However, the electro‐hydraulic system of the rock drilling jumbo has strong parameters uncertainties and some dynamics that are hard to model accurately, which causes certain challenges for designing model‐based high‐performance control algorithms. To solve these challenges, a parameter adaptive based neural network sliding mode control algorithm is proposed to enhance control performance of the electro‐hydraulic system. The parameter adaptive law is developed to estimate unknown parameters of the system, the neural network is applied for compensating unmodeled dynamics, and then the final control law is designed by sliding mode control method, and the stability demonstration of the closed‐loop system is given. In the simulations, the effectiveness of the designed parameter adaptive law is verified. Extensive comparison experiments are performed on a real rock drilling jumbo driven by proportional valves, the experimental results demonstrate that the developed control algorithm obviously improves the control precision of hydraulic cylinder of the rock drilling jumbo compared with the traditional sliding mode and PID control algorithm, thus the designed control algorithm can be expanded and applied for general hydraulic servo control mechanism.