Development of a Control System for Double-Pendulum Active Spray Boom Suspension Based on PSO and Fuzzy PID

During the operation of boom sprayers in the field, it is crucial to ensure that the entire boom is maintained at an optimal height relative to the ground or crop canopy. Active suspension is usually used to adjust the height. A control system for double-pendulum active suspension was developed in this paper. The control system consisted of a main control node, two distance measurement nodes, a vehicle inclination detection node, and an execution node. Communication between nodes was carried out using a CAN bus. The hardware was selected, and the interface circuits of the sensors and the actuator were designed. The transfer functions of the active suspension and electric linear actuator were established. In order to enhance the efficiency of the control system, the particle swarm optimization (PSO) algorithm was employed to optimize the initial parameters of the fuzzy PID controller. The simulation results demonstrated that the PSO-based fuzzy PID controller exhibited improvements in terms of reduced overshoot and decreased settling time when compared to conventional PID and fuzzy PID controllers. The experimental results showed that the active suspension system equipped with the control system could effectively isolate high-frequency disturbances and follow low-frequency ground undulations, meeting the operational requirements.