  Automation of cranes can have a direct impact on the productivity of
construction projects. In this paper, we focus on the control of one of the
most used cranes, the boom crane. Tower cranes and overhead cranes have been
widely studied in the literature, whereas the control of boom cranes has been
investigated only by a few works. Typically, these works make use of simple
models making use of a large number of simplifying assumptions (e.g. fixed
length cable, assuming certain dynamics are uncoupled, etc.) A first result of
this paper is to present a fairly complete nonlinear dynamic model of a boom
crane taking into account all coupling dynamics and where the only simplifying
assumption is that the cable is considered as rigid. The boom crane involves
pitching and rotational movements, which generate complicated centrifugal
forces, and consequently, equations of motion highly nonlinear. On the basis of
this model, a control law has been developed able to perform position control
of the crane while actively damping the oscillations of the load. The
effectiveness of the approach has been tested in simulation with realistic
physical parameters and tested in the presence of wind disturbances.
