Fault-Tolerant Control of Quadrotors with Actuator Faults: Experimental Verification of a Backstepping-Based Adaptive Controller

In many unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) applications, achieving stable flight despite actuator failures is crucial. Among the many existing fault-tolerant control (FTC) methods, adaptive control is a practical approach. In this article, we present experimental verification of a backstepping-based adaptive fault-tolerant controller previously proposed by the authors. As the first step of the experimental verification, we focus on the attitude-loop control of the quadrotor. We construct a quadrotor testbed integrating a self-developed flight controller. After parameter identification, we implement the adaptive fault-tolerant controller on the quadrotor. Finally, real-time experiments on attitude stabilization following actuator faults are conducted. As a result, we confirmed that the controller can be implemented and can stabilize the attitude even in the presence of multi-actuator faults.