Automatic Control Systems

Course goals: To learn the fundamentals of modeling, analysis and control of feedback
control systems.

 Understand why automatic control is useful

 Recognize the value of “control”
 Recognize when a process is easy or difficult to control
 Know key ideas and concepts of feedback control system
 Be able to solve simple control problems
 Be aware of analysis and design tools

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What is a control system?

u (t ) P( s ) y (t )

input signal system output signal

Signal: something that conveys information, in this course, signal is a physical variable
that varies with time (function of time).

System: process/plane to be controlled, contains two signals (input and output).

Control: manipulate certain signals such that the interested signal in a system is
maintained or altered in accordance with a desired manner.
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Applications

 Flight control systems  Consumer electronics

 Space vehicles  Economy
 Automotive (cruise control,  Biology
steering control,…)  Medicine
 CD player  …
 Temperature control 

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History of Control

 Water clock

float regulator
keep constant level
 yield a constant
flow of water
Tank 1

 Filled the second tank at a constant rate  Level of water depends

on time elapsed

Tank 2

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 Watt’s governor (~ 1780)

 Increased engine speed causes fly balls

to move out from rotating shaft
 Throttle valve closes a little
 Steam flow reduced, hence returning
speed to setpoint

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 Airy 1840, British Astronomer
 Developed a feedback device for pointing a telescope
 A speed control system which turned the telescope automatically to compensate
for the earth’s rotation.
 Discovered that improper design of the feedback control loop, wild oscillations
were introduced into the system.
 The first to discuss the instability of closed-loop system.
 The first to use differential equations in their analysis.

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 Maxwell (1868)
 Gave a differential equation model of Watt’s fly ball governor.
 Linearized the differential equations of motion to find the characteristic equation
of the system.
 Studied the effect of the system parameters on stability.
 System is stable if roots of the characteristic equation have negative real parts.
 Posed question of stability of a high-order ( > 3) differential equation.

Answer given by Routh (1877). We will study Routh’s stability criterion in this class.

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 Frequency-Domain Analysis
The mathematical analysis of control systems had been carried out using differential
equations in time domain at Bell Telephone Lab during 1920’s and 1930’s.
Frequency domain approaches developed by
 Laplace (1749 - 1827)
 Fourier (1768 – 1830)
 Cauchy (1789 – 1857)

 Black (1927)
 Invented the electronic feedback amplifier.
 Demonstrated the usefulness of negative feedback.

 Nyquist (1932)
 Derived his Nyquist stability criterion based on the polar plot of a complex function.
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 Bode (1940)
 Magnitude and phase frequency response plots of a complex function.
 Investigated closed-loop stability using the notions of gain and phase margin.

 Evans (1948)
 Developed the root locus technique
 Showing dependence of closed-loop system roots on a design parameter.
This is a quick historical account of “classical control”, the object of this class.

Modern Control ? (1960 ~ )

 State-space description
 Vector differential equations
 Linear algebra
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 Open and closed-loop system

Open-loop control system Closed-loop control system

disturbance d
d
+ e u y
r u y r Controller Plant
Controller Plant _

controlled output
referenced input
input negative feedback
(desired output yd ) (a tradition)

Example: cruise control

plant: car, output: velocity
u : throttle, r , (or yd ) : desired velocity
disturbance: slope of road

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Practical situation

Open loop
d
u ua up y
r Controller actuator Plant sensor

Closed loop
d
+ e u ua up y
r Controller actuator Plant
_

sensor

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Usually,

+ e u ua up y
r Controller actuator Plant sensor
_
Plant

Basic component of a control system

Plant (or process), actuators (input devices), sensors (output devices),
Controller (or control processor), disturbance

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Plant (or processor): the system to be controlled
 Aircraft, missiles, CD player, …
Actuators: input devices (transducers) that convert control signals into plant variables, so
as to act on the plant.
 Motors, solenoids, power amplifiers, heating elements, pump, …
Sensors: output devices (tranducers) that measure the plant outputs.
 Position sensor (LVDT, RVDT, …), tachometer (revolution speed), speedometer,
thermometer, strain gauge, …
Controller (or control processor): process sensor signals to yield actuator signals.
 Analog electronics, digital computers, human, …
Disturbance: signals that affect the system, but are beyond our control, usually unknown.
 Fluctuations in operating condition, wind gusts, noise,…

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Why feedback
 Reduce effects of process disturbances
d d
+ e u y
r u y r K P
K P _

y  Pu  Pd  PK (r  y )  Pd
y  Pu  Pd  PKr  Pd PK P
 r d
1  PK 1  PK
Choose K such that
No control on Choose K such that PK large in certain
PK = 1 (not always
the disturbance P
possible) frequency range, then y  r , and
1  PK
then, y  r if d  0
small
 reject the disturbance

Note: P may not know exactly, (assumptions, model uncertainties)

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  Insensitive to process variations
Assuming d  0 , let the transfer function from r to y is T ,
Open-loop system, T  PK Closed-loop system, d  0  T 
PK
T T / T T P P
1  PK
 K   K 1 T
P P / P P T PK 
K
 PK 1  PK  K
2

% change in T P 1  PK
 1  1  PK
% change in P PK  K
K  2

 1  PK  1  PK   1  PK 
2 2

T / T T P K P 1
     
P / P P T 1  PK 2 PK 1  PK
1  PK
If 1  PK  1 (usually true at certain frequency
range)  closed-loop system is less sensitive to
the process variation.

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  Stabilize the unstable system

e y 2
r + u 1
y  s 1 
2 1
_ s 1
1
2 s 1
s 1

 Risk for instability – feedback can improve stability or harmful to stability.

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Controller structure
 Proportional plus derivative plus derivative
 On-off control
control (PID control):
t de
u u u u  K P e  K I  edt K D
0 dt
e e e  Phase lead/lag compensators
 Internal model design
 Many other controller structure
 Proportional control (P control): - Modern control
u  K P  e , (u  K Pe  u0 ) - Robust control
 Proportional plus integral control (PI - Nonlinear control
t
control): u  K P e  K I  edt - Adaptive control
0 - Fuzzy control
 Proportional plus derivative control - …
de
(PD control): u  K P e  K D
dt

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Integral action
t
PI control: u (t )  K Pe( )  K I 0 e( )d
Assume that there is an equilibrium with constant e(t )  e0 , and constant u (t )  u0 ,
then e0  0 .
t
u  K Pe  K I  e( )d  K Pe0  K I e0t  e0  0
0
 integral action may eliminate the steady-state error.

Derivative action
de
eP  e(t )  Td
e dt

predictive error

t t+Td

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 Basic steps in control engineering
1. Modeling /Identification
 Translate engineering problem into Factors:
mathematical problem.  Accuracy v.s. complexity
(2 modes? 10 modes?)
 Mathematic description of the plant  Ease of analysis
 Physical law and assumptions  Economic consideration (special
tool maybe needed to analyze a
 Usually in differential equation form. complicated model)
 Decide on model  Model validation

 linear model  Running tests on the real system

 linear model with parameters that are  Validate model: how good the

not known exactly identified model is.

 nonlinear model

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2. Analysis
 How well does system (model) works
 Stability
 Performance: transient, steady state
 Sensitivity to ambient conditions (disturbance).
 Questions can be answered by the solution to the mathematic model or by
simulation.

 What if the results are not satisfies?

 Specification – the desired performance.

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3. Design (controller synthesis)
 Based on the plant model and design specification.
 Determine the control law (research)
 Implement the control law (engineering)
 Controller architecture
 Hardware/software
4. Test performance of the closed-loop system
 Implement the controller on the real system (not the model)
 Performance validation
 Design iterations are usually required.

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This course, we will cover
 Some modeling: electrical networks, mechanical systems elements, DC motors
 Analysis
 Only single-input-single-output, linear time-invariant systems (LTI).
 Stability
 Time domain analysis
 Frequency domain analysis
 Design
 Root-locus
 PID

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Design example: water flow control
VC

water flow actural water level

desired water level yd y water flow

VO
Water tank (plant)
Control objective:
Maintain y(t )  yd (t ) , whenever possible, by regulating the water supply via the
upstream control valve VC .

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Open-loop control

yd VC y
Controller actuator Water tank

y  yd will be achieved at some t  t * , but e  yd  y (system error) may be developed

due to
 pressure (flow rate) variation at VC , (disturbance)
 parameter variations (e.g. gradual change of flow resistance, foreign objects, …)

 open loop control does not result in high performance

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Closed-loop feedback control system

+ e u VC y
yd Controller actuator Water tank
_

sensor

Principle of operation
 e  yd  y is evaluated continuously and used to adjust the control valve VC
e  0 , increase VC , e  0 decrease VC
for example, VC  VC0  Ke(t )

 closed-loop control can compensate for the disturbance.

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Design example: cruise control
F

mg

Plant input (control variable):gas pedal u Plant output: velocity v

Reference input (desired output): vr Disturbance: slope 

vr + e u up v
_ Controller Plant

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Mathematic model The closed-loop system
dv dv
m  bv  F  mg sin  Plant model:  0.02v  u  10
dt dt
t
with reasonable parameters PI controller: u  K P e  K I  e( )d
0
dv
 0.02v  u  10 e vr  v
dt
where du de d 2v dv d
  KP  K I e  2  0.02  10
v : m/s dt dt dt dt dt
u : normalized throttle 0  u  1 dv dvr de de
v  vr  e     , ( vr constant)
 : slope (rad) dt dt dt dt
de d 2e de d
 KP  K I e   2  0.02  10
dt dt dt dt

d 2e de d
 2   K P  0.02   K I e  10
dt dt dt
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Dynamical system

d 2e de d
2
  K P  0.02   K I e  10
dt dt dt
in steady state,  and e are constant  e  0  v  vr
Questions?
 how fast v  vr ?
 in what way v  vr ?

How is the behavior of the differential equation

d 2e de d
  K P  0.02   K I e  10
dt 2 dt dt
influenced by the parameters K P and K I ?

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Now, compare with the mass-spring-damper system

k
F
m
2
d x
 b
dx
 kx  F
m
2 b
dt dt
x

We know the behavior of this equation quite well already. (check the lecture notes of
signals and systems)
Set F  0 , and convert into standard form

d 2x dx
 2  2n  n2 x  0 ,  : damping factor, n : undamped natural frequency
dt dt
The behavior of the equation depends on  and n .
n gives the response speed.
 gives the shape of the response.
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For cruise control,
2n  K P  0.02 , n2  K I
choose  and n , ( K P and K I ) to see the response. (You are designing the controller
now) Do it.

What have we done?

 block diagram of the control system.
 plant model in O.D.E. (ordinary differential equation)
 select controller structure in O.D.E.
 eliminate variables to obtain error dynamics of the closed-loop system (in ODE also).
 understand how the closed-loop system behavior.
 select controller parameters to give desired behavior.
 fine tune parameters by simulation or experiment.
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