Active Disturbance Rejection Control for Vibration Suppression of a Dual-Arm Cooperative Rigid-Flexible Coupling Hoisting Robot

To address payload vibration suppression in dual-arm cooperative rigid-flexible coupling hoisting robots (DCRFCHRs) under system parameter uncertainties and external disturbances, a novel active disturbance rejection control method is proposed. In contrast to prevalent crane vibration suppression approaches based on energy dissipation perspectives, the method can precisely estimate underactuated variables and incorporate them into the controller design. The dynamic model of the DCRFCHR is established. Combined with the control objectives, the active disturbance rejection controller is designed. This controller consists of an improved nonlinear extended state observer (imp-NESO) and a nonlinear state error feedback law. A dual-ESO architecture is employed to perform state observation and disturbance estimation for the fully actuated and underactuated subsystems, respectively. Furthermore, a composite signal is designed based on integral terminal attractor theory for control compensation. This integration significantly enhances the system’s capability to estimate external disturbances. Simultaneously, the improved nonlinear extended state observer incorporates an optimized compensation mechanism for observation gains, thereby improving both convergence speed and estimation accuracy. Simulation and experimental results demonstrate that the proposed method achieves higher positioning accuracy and better payload vibration suppression compared to other existing approaches. The effectiveness and robustness are also experimentally validated.