Readiness Barrier Functions: Forward-Invariant Control Authority for Overactuated Multirotor Allocation

Abstract

Allocation schemes that greedily maximize a readiness metric over the actuator fiber bundle of an overactuated multirotor produce commands that jump between disconnected optimal strata, demanding actuator rates no motor can deliver; effort-minimizing schemes are continuous but cannot guarantee that wrench-rate authority stays above any certified level. We reconcile the two by treating authority as a forward-invariant quantity: a control barrier function on the log-determinant of the drag-aware actuator-authority co-metric, enforced at torque level by a quadratic program in the allocation null space. A single design inequality renders the certified set compact and strictly interior to the actuator box, with the readiness cost of any rotor deactivation given in closed form as $\ln (n/(n-m))$ for symmetric designs. An explicit alignment ratio states when tracking can stay exact, otherwise the wrench error is bounded by $\mathcal{O}({\rho }^{-1/2})$, and a robust variant handles motor-parameter uncertainty with a closed-form floor shift independent of the airframe matrix. On a hexarotor and a fully-actuated octorotor the closed-form gap matches simulation to machine precision. Over $300$ randomized missions, greedy maximization violates the certified floor in up to $51\%$ of authority-scarce missions, while the proposed filter never leaves the certified set and, in the hardest moment reversal, commits a $79\times$ smaller wrench error. The robust variant holds the floor on all $150$ perturbed plants. A high-fidelity simulation with measured propeller and motor data shows that the floor holds under unmodeled aerodynamics, electrical limits, and delay, and where it stops applying.

arXiv commentThis work has been submitted to the IEEE for possible publication