Patent Document ID: 5406488
Application ID: 08083332
Patent Flag: 1

Claim One:
1. An autopilot for the control of the physical state of a vehicle system such as ships, submarines, aircraft and weapons, said vehicle system having system dynamics responsive to at least one control input, wherein said autopilot can accurately maintain said vehicle system in a desired physical state in the presence of an unknown disturbance, said autopilot comprising: (a) means for providing a vehicle system state estimator comprising: an immutable model of said vehicle system, said model derived from characteristics of said vehicle system when operating within an environment free of unknown disturbances; and means, responsive to said immutable model and said at least one control input, for providing an estimated value of at least one state variable; (b) means for setting a desired value of said at least one state variable; (c) measurement means for providing a measured value of said at least one state variable; (d) comparison means for comparing said estimated value with a corresponding measured value by subtracting said estimated value from said corresponding measured value and for providing at least one estimation error value; and (e) means, responsive to said estimated value, to said at least one estimation error value and to said desired value, for providing said at least one control input to both said vehicle system and said means for providing a vehicle system state estimator, where said at leas tone control input, in combination with said vehicle dynamics, causes said at least one state variable to approach said desired value of said at least one state variable.