Actual Experiment of Robotic Sailing Boat with Fuzzy Rules

Abstract

Automatic operation of sailboat attracts attention as a means of maritime transportation that uses only natural power of wind. In our previous studies, automatic sailing using GPS was realized, but there were problems of excessive rolling at strong wind conditions and of discrete crisp use of rudder and sail controllers. Therefore, in this study, based on the research of Stelzer et al., fuzzy control for wind strength was newly implemented. And we fuzzified the if-then rules used in our previous studies. We confirmed that roll angle can be suppressed and continues control signals can be output by actual experiments.