Sliding Mode Extremum Seeking Control Based PID of a Quadrotor

This paper presents a modern methodology for controlling a quadrotor system through the automatic tuning of Proportional-Integral-Derivative (PID) controller, using the Sliding Mode Extremum Seeking Control (SMESC) framework. The proposed approach combines the inherent robustness of Sliding Mode Control (SMC) with the adaptive, model-free optimization capability of Extremum Seeking Control (ESC), enabling online performance optimization without requiring an accurate system model. In contrast to offline tuning methods, the proposed SMESC-based PID tuning continuously adjusts the control gains during operation, based solely on real-time tracking error information, ensuring robustness against disturbances and parameter variations. as well as time-varying operating conditions, and enabling real-time adjustment of PID gains. Quantitatively, the proposed SMESC approach improves the rise time by approximately 40% as well as the settling time by about 30% compared to the PSO-based PID controller. In addition, the proposed approach significantly reduces overshoot by more than 60%. The findings demonstrate that the SMESC-PID controller delivers markedly enhanced stability and overall performance when compared with the conventional PSO-PID-based approach. To further evaluate robustness, the system was subjected to additive external disturbances in order to assess the stability and resilience of the proposed controller under challenging operating conditions. The simulation results clearly show that the proposed control methodology significantly outperforms traditional tuning techniques, providing superior disturbance-rejection capabilities and substantially improved stability in quadrotor flight control.