ABSTRACT
The paper examines the application of a fuzzy self-tuning controller for ship course steering. The controller is composed of fuzzy and linear PID controllers. Following the control system heading error and its change combined with fuzzy control rules, the fuzzy controller can adjust parameters of PID controller. The initial values of PID gains were calculated with the use of the classical linear control theory and the placement method. The PID controller was synthesized using the Nomoto model of ship dynamics identified on the basis of standard Kempfs zigzag manoeuvre and the Ant Colony Optimization algorithm (ACO). The ACO algorithm is a bio-inspired optimization method that has proven its success through various combinatorial optimization problems. The research of the designed control system was carried out on the training ship Blue Lady in the Ship Handling Research and Training Centre on the lake Silm in Ilawa/Kamionka. The results of full-scale trials have revealed that the proposed scheme has smaller overshoot and shorter settling time.
