A Non-Uniform Predictor-Observer for a Networked Control System

International Journal of Control, Automation and Systems - This paper presents a Non-Uniform Predictor-Observer (NUPO) based control approach in order to deal with two of the main problems related...     

Phase-conditionally stable systems

In this paper, the phase-conditionally stable feature of a closed-loop system is introduced. In any control loop, time delays appear and can produce unexpected changes in the controlled-system performances. Usually, these effects are negative and performance is degraded. The possible positive effect of the delays in avoiding oscillatory plant response is here considered. For that purpose, the effect of additional measurement delays, filters or dead time in resonant systems, is analyzed. Some examples illustrate the results. Other than the possible practical relevance of the results, the concepts involved are very important for the control engineers at educational level.     

Robustness analysis of discrete predictor-based controllers for input-delay systems

In this article, robustness to model uncertainties are analysed in the context of discrete predictor-based state-feedback controllers for discrete-time input-delay systems with time-varying delay, in an LMI framework. The goal is comparing robustness of predictor-based strategies with respect to other (sub)optimal state feedback ones. A numerical example illustrates that improvements in tolerance to modelling errors can be achieved by using the predictor framework.     

Robust predictive extended state observer for a class of nonlinear systems with time-varying input delay

ABSTRACT

This paper deals with asymptotic stabilisation of a class of nonlinear input-delayed systems via dynamic output feedback in the presence of disturbances. The proposed strategy has the structure of an observer-based control law, in which the observer estimates and predicts both the plant state and the external disturbance. A nominal delay value is assumed to be known and stability conditions in terms of linear matrix inequalities are derived for fast-varying delay uncertainties. Asymptotic stability is achieved if the disturbance or the time delay is constant. The controller design problem is also addressed and a numerical example with an unstable system is provided to illustrate the usefulness of the proposed strategy.     

Predictor-based stabilization of discrete time-varying input-delay systems

This paper adapts some literature results on stabilizing discrete time-varying input delay systems to the case of having a predictor-based controller. The objective of the paper is showing that the incorporation of predictors to the referred results is relatively simple and, by means of such predictors, robustness against delay mismatch in the input channel may be improved. In this way, larger delay variation margins are proved with predictors when compared to standard memoryless state feedback, as intuitively expected, due to the extra past information available.     

Robust tuning of a generalized predictor-based controller for integrating and unstable systems with long time-delay

In this work, a general structure to control long time-delay plants is proposed and an easy methodology to tune the control parameters is outlined. All the sensitivity transfer functions are delay free. The proposed scheme is equivalent to the Smith predictor but able to cope with any kind of systems, including non-minimum phase, unstable and integrating plants. The controllers are designed based on the delay free model. Contrary to other approaches, other than for the digital implementation, no delay approximation is used. A tuning parameter is provided in order to reach an intuitive tradeoff between performance and robust stability. A comparative analysis with respect to recently successful proposals shows a substantial improvement in the performance/robustness tradeoff as well as in the tuning process.     

Dead-time-compensator for unstable MIMO systems with multiple time delays

In this paper a new dead-time-compensator to deal with unstable time delay systems is presented. The result is an extension to multiple-input multiple-output systems with multiple and different time delays of a previous result already reported for single-input single-output systems. There are two key issues: the system instability and the presence of different time delays in each signal channel. The proposed approach is developed in three steps. First, a non-delayed output plant is predicted. This predictor is a stable dead-time-compensator coping with multiple and arbitrary delays in all the signal channels. Then, a stabilizer controller is easily designed for the resulting non-delayed plant. For this stabilized plant, the control performance is improved in order to achieve some output tracking and regulation requirements. The results are illustrated by two examples showing their applicability to unstable multiple-input multiple-output multi-delayed plants, which is the main novelty of the proposed approach.     

Interactive tool for analysis of time-delay systems with dead-time compensators

The problem of controlling delayed systems has been widely studied in the control community. The Smith predictor (SP) scheme was the most famous and efficient technique to cope with this problem. Afterwards, robustness problems and those related to the control of integrating and unstable delayed processes were resolved. This work presents an interactive tool for studying and understanding the different alternatives available for controlling systems with large delays. Interactive tools have provided excellent support for the control community during recent years. In this sense, the tool developed here helps to compare easily the performance of PID controllers and SP approaches for processes with delay, as well as other control structures used to solve different problems that the original SP has when integrator and unstable models are employed. Robustness problems due to presence of model uncertainties can also be analyzed. Furthermore, some real industrial processes are also described as motivation in the study of the problems presented in the paper. The tool incorporates a set of typical transfer functions based on these real industrial processes.     

Block multirate input-output model for sampled-data control systems

A model for multirate sampled-data systems is presented. A detailed analysis of nonconventional sampled-data control systems (SDCS) is performed. The block multirate input-output model illustrates the control possibilities of multirate SDCS. It is obtained from either a transfer function matrix or a state variable representation. The model provides a direct way to represent, design, and understand either periodic or predictive controllers. A controller design methodology suitable for multivariable, multirate, nonsynchronous SDCS is also presented. The main feature is the freedom to achieve important objectives such as structure assignment, decoupling, and desired transient behavior, as well as reference matching, optimal control, or disturbance rejection