Nonlinear controls of a rotating tower crane in conjunction with trolley motion

Based on two nonlinear control techniques composed of partial feedback linearization and sliding mode control, the robust nonlinear controllers are successfully designed in the case of crane’s complicated operation in which a combination of trolley translation and tower rotation is considered. The proposed controllers concurrently implement four duties well: rotating tower and moving trolley to desired positions from their initial positions precisely, keeping small the cargo swings during transport process, and completely suppressing them at cargo destination. The simulation results show the high qualities of system responses and asymptotical stability of all state trajectories. The robustness of two suggested controllers is also analyzed and compared through simulation.