A Supervisor for Control of Mode-switch Process

Many processes operate only around a limited number of operation points. In order to have adequate control around each operation point, and adaptive controller could be used. When the operation point changes often, a large number of parameters would have to be adapted over and over again. This makes application of conventional adaptive control unattractive, which is more suited for processes with slowly changing parameters. Furthermore, continuous adaptation is not always needed or desired. An extension of adaptive control is presented, in which for each operation point the process behaviour can be stored in a memory, retrieved from it and evaluated. These functions are co-ordinated by a ¿supervisor¿. This concept is referred to as a supervisor for control of mode-switch processes. It leads to an adaptive control structure which quickly adjusts the controller parameters based on retrieval of old information, without the need to fully relearn each time. This approach has been tested on experimental set-ups of a flexible beam and of a flexible two-link robot arm, but it is directly applicable to other processes, for instance, in the (petro) chemical industry

PID control system analysis and design

With its three-term functionality offering treatment of both transient and steady-state responses, proportional-integral-derivative (PID) control provides a generic and efficient solution to realworld control problems. The wide application of PID control has stimulated and sustained research and development to "get the best out of PID", and "the search is on to find the next key technology or methodology for PID tuning". This article presents remedies for problems involving the integral and derivative terms. PID design objectives, methods, and future directions are discussed. Subsequently, a computerized, simulation-based approach is presented, together with illustrative design results for first-order, higher order, and nonlinear plants. Finally, we discuss differences between academic research and industrial practice, so as to motivate new research directions in PID control

PID control system analysis, design, and technology

Designing and tuning a proportional-integral-derivative (PID) controller appears to be conceptually intuitive, but can be hard in practice, if multiple (and often conflicting) objectives such as short transient and high stability are to be achieved. Usually, initial designs obtained by all means need to be adjusted repeatedly through computer simulations until the closed-loop system performs or compromises as desired. This stimulates the development of "intelligent" tools that can assist engineers to achieve the best overall PID control for the entire operating envelope. This development has further led to the incorporation of some advanced tuning algorithms into PID hardware modules. Corresponding to these developments, this paper presents a modern overview of functionalities and tuning methods in patents, software packages and commercial hardware modules. It is seen that many PID variants have been developed in order to improve transient performance, but standardising and modularising PID control are desired, although challenging. The inclusion of system identification and "intelligent" techniques in software based PID systems helps automate the entire design and tuning process to a useful degree. This should also assist future development of "plug-and-play" PID controllers that are widely applicable and can be set up easily and operate optimally for enhanced productivity, improved quality and reduced maintenance requirements

Integrated flight/propulsion control design for a STOVL aircraft using H-infinity control design techniques

Results are presented from an application of H-infinity control design methodology to a centralized integrated flight propulsion control (IFPC) system design for a supersonic Short Takeoff and Vertical Landing (STOVL) fighter aircraft in transition flight. The emphasis is on formulating the H-infinity control design problem such that the resulting controller provides robustness to modeling uncertainties and model parameter variations with flight condition. Experience gained from a preliminary H-infinity based IFPC design study performed earlier is used as the basis to formulate the robust H-infinity control design problem and improve upon the previous design. Detailed evaluation results are presented for a reduced order controller obtained from the improved H-infinity control design showing that the control design meets the specified nominal performance objectives as well as provides stability robustness for variations in plant system dynamics with changes in aircraft trim speed within the transition flight envelope. A controller scheduling technique which accounts for changes in plant control effectiveness with variation in trim conditions is developed and off design model performance results are presented

Superheat control for air conditioning and refrigeration systems: Simulation and experiments

Ever since the invention of air conditioning and refrigeration in the late nineteenth century, there has been tremendous interest in increasing system efficiency to reduce the impact these systems have on global energy consumption. Efficiency improvements have been accomplished through component design, refrigerant design, and most recently control system design. The emergence of the electronic expansion valve and variable speed drives has made immense impacts on the ability to regulate system parameters, resulting in important strides towards efficiency improvement. This research presents tools and methodologies for model development and controller design for air conditioning and refrigeration systems. In this thesis, control-oriented nonlinear dynamic models are developed and validated with test data collected from a fully instrumented experimental system. These models enable the design of advanced control configurations which supplement the performance of the commonly used proportional-integral-derivative (PID) controller. Evaporator superheat is a key parameter considered in this research since precise control optimizes evaporator efficiency while protecting the system from component damage. The controllers developed in this thesis ultimately provide better transient and steady state performance which increases system efficiency through low superheat set point design. The developed controllers also address the classical performance versus robustness tradeoff through design which preserves transients while prolonging the lifetime of the electronic expansion valve. Another notable contribution of this thesis is the development of hardware-in-the-loop load emulation which provides a method to test component and software control loop performance. This method alleviates the costs associated with the current method of testing using environmental test chambers

Intelligent flight control systems

The capabilities of flight control systems can be enhanced by designing them to emulate functions of natural intelligence. Intelligent control functions fall in three categories. Declarative actions involve decision-making, providing models for system monitoring, goal planning, and system/scenario identification. Procedural actions concern skilled behavior and have parallels in guidance, navigation, and adaptation. Reflexive actions are spontaneous, inner-loop responses for control and estimation. Intelligent flight control systems learn knowledge of the aircraft and its mission and adapt to changes in the flight environment. Cognitive models form an efficient basis for integrating 'outer-loop/inner-loop' control functions and for developing robust parallel-processing algorithms

On the interpretation and identification of dynamic Takagi-Sugenofuzzy models

Dynamic Takagi-Sugeno fuzzy models are not always easy to interpret, in particular when they are identified from experimental data. It is shown that there exists a close relationship between dynamic Takagi-Sugeno fuzzy models and dynamic linearization when using affine local model structures, which suggests that a solution to the multiobjective identification problem exists. However, it is also shown that the affine local model structure is a highly sensitive parametrization when applied in transient operating regimes. Due to the multiobjective nature of the identification problem studied here, special considerations must be made during model structure selection, experiment design, and identification in order to meet both objectives. Some guidelines for experiment design are suggested and some robust nonlinear identification algorithms are studied. These include constrained and regularized identification and locally weighted identification. Their usefulness in the present context is illustrated by examples