Robust Nonlinear Control Design with Proportional-Integral-Observer Technique

In this thesis, the motivation is explained in the introduction part based on a review of the development of observer technique especially the Proportional-Integral-Observer (PI-Observer) technique and an analysis of robust control for nonlinear systems. After that, the goals of the work are set as: improvement of the high gain PI-Observer design in the way that the high observer gains of PI-Observer can be automatically chosen and fit the current situation; and the application of PI-Observer in robust nonlinear control for nonlinear systems with unknown effects. To the first point, the high-gain PI-Observer design is systematically discussed and the online adjustment of the PI-Observer gains proposed as an advanced PI-Observer (API-Observer) is detailed. At the same time, the implementation of the addressed adjustment algorithm is included showing the adaption of the PI-Observer gains to the current situation of system dynamics and disturbances on a practical system with simulation results and real measurements respectively. To the other aspect, a high gain PI-Observer-based nonlinear control method is proposed as a combination of the PI-Observer and the classical exact feedback linearization method (EFL-PIO) and directly after it the applicability on mechanical systems is surveyed. Numerical examples of mechanical systems are given to illustrate the application of the EFL-PIO approach. At last, the implementation of the proposed PI-Observer-based nonlinear control method is illustrated in detail on a hydraulic cylinder system for its position control. Besides that, the position control for the cylinder system without direct position measurement is realized with the PI-Observer applied as virtual sensor. Here a discrete-time control algorithm is also designed and programmed to satisfy the normal industrial requirement. At last, a broader application of the robust EFL-PIO approach, a more efficient and compact numerical realization of the adaption algorithm for the API-Observer, and an API-Observer-based robust control or fault detection are suggested as future work

Entwurf eines Beobachterbasierten Robusten Nichtlinearen Reglers

Due to observers ability in the estimation of internal system states, observers play an important role in the field of control and monitoring of dynamical systems. In reality, using sensors to measure the desired system states may be costly and/or affects the reliability of technical systems. Besides, some signals are impractical or inaccessible to be measured and using of sensors leads to significant errors such as stochastic noise. The solution of using observers is well-known since 1964. Besides the estimation of system states, some observers are able to estimate unknown inputs affecting the system dynamics such as disturbance forces or torques. These features are helpful for supervision and fault diagnosis tasks by monitoring the sensors and system components or for advanced control purposes by realizing observer-based control for practical systems. Among the state and disturbance observers, Proportional-Integral-Observer (PIO) is highly appreciated because of its simple structure and design procedure. Furthermore, using sufficiently high gain PIO, a robust estimation of system states and unknown inputs can be achieved. Besides taking the advantages of high gain design, the disadvantages of large overshoot and strong influence from measurement noise (as typical drawbacks of high gain utilization) in the control and estimation performance can not be neglected. Recently, some researches have been done to overcome the disadvantages of high gain observers and to adaptively adjust the gain of observer based on the resulting actual performance. Considering the advantages and disadvantages of high gain PIO besides the recent developments, it is evident that there are still open problems and questions to be solved in the area of optimal design of PIO and robust nonlinear control approaches based on PIO. On the other hand, the PI-Observer can be used in combination with linear/nonlinear control approaches (due to its simple structure and capability to estimate the system states and disturbances) to improve the performance and robustness of the closed-loop control results. Therefore, this thesis focuses on development and improvement of high gain Proportional-Integral-Observer as well as utilization of this observer in combination with well-known robust control approaches for possible general application in nonlinear systems. The Modified Advanced PIO (MAPIO) is introduced in this work as the extended version of Advanced PIO (APIO) to tune the gain of PIO according to the current situation. A cost function is defined so that the estimation performance and the related energy can be evaluated. Comparison between advanced observer design approaches has been done in the task of reconstructing the nonlinear characteristics and estimating the external inputs (contact forces) acting to elastic mechanical structures. Simulation results in open-loop and closed-loop cases verified that the performance of MAPIO in the task of unknown input estimation is more robust to different levels of measurement noise in comparison to previous methods e.g. APIO and standard high/low gain PIO. Furthermore, a new gain design approach of Proportional-Integral-Observer is proposed to overcome the disadvantages of high gain PIO and to realize the estimation of fast dynamical behaviors like unknown impact force. The dynamics of this force input is assumed as unknown. The idea of funnel control is taking into consideration to design the PIO gain. The important advantage of the proposed approach compared to previously published PIO gain design is the self-adjustment of observer gains according to the actual estimation situation inside the predefined funnel area. In this thesis it is shown that the proposed funnel PI-Observer algorithm allows adaptive PIO gain calculation, being able to be situatively adjusted even in the presence of measurement noise. Stability proof of funnel PI-Observer is investigated according to the switching observer condition and Lyapunov theory. The effectiveness of the proposed method is evaluated by simulation and experimental results using an elastic beam test rig. Furthermore, a nonlinear MIMO mechanical system is used to verify the effectiveness of the proposed method in the closed-loop context. Additionally, this thesis provides two new PI-Observer-based robust controllers as PIO-based sliding mode control and PIO-based backstepping control to improve the position tracking performance of a hydraulic differential cylinder system in the presence of uncertainties e.g. modeling errors, disturbances, and measurement noise. To use the linear PIO for estimation of system states and unknown inputs, the input-output feedback linearization approach is used to linearize the nonlinear model of hydraulic differential cylinder system. Thereupon the result of state and unknown input estimation is integrated into the structure of robust control design (here SMC and backstepping control) to eliminate the effects of uncertainties and disturbances. The introduced PIO-based robust controllers guarantee the ultimate boundness of the tracking error in the presence of uncertainties. The closed-loop stability is proved using Lyapunov theory in both cases. The proposed methods are experimentally validated and the results are compared with the standard SMC and industrial standard approach P-Controller in the presence of measurement noise, model uncertainties, and external disturbances. A general comparison of SMC and backstepping control approaches is provided in the last part of this work.Die Regelung und Überwachung dynamischer Systeme kann voraussetzen, dass Informationen über interne Systemzustände bekannt sind. Die Verwendung von Sensoren zur Erfassung aller Systemzustände kann erhöhte Kosten zur Folge haben und die Systemzuverlässigkeit negativ beeinflussen. Weitere Probleme ergeben sich dadurch, dass ggf. nicht jeder Systemzustand sensorisch erfasst werden kann. Der Beobachter erlaubt die Rekonstruktion aller Systemzustände auf Grundlage weniger Messungen. Neben Systemzuständen können externe Eingangsgrößen wie Reibmomente und Störungen geschätzt werden. Als Konsequenz ermöglicht der Beobachter eine gegenüber Störungen robuste Regelung und Fehlerdiagnose technischer Systeme. Der Proportional-Integral-Observer (PIO) kann mittels bestehender Entwurfsverfahren einfach implementiert werden. Durch Anpassen der Rückkopplungsmatrix eignet sich der PIO zur kombinierten Schätzung von Zuständen und unbekannten Eingangsgrößen. In diesem Zusammenhang spielt die Wahl einer betragsmäßig großen Rückkopplungsverstärkungsmatrix, als sogenannter High Gain Ansatz, eine entscheidende Rolle. Weiterhin hängt die Performance des PIO von der unbekannten Charakteristik der zu schätzenden Eingangsgröße ab. Diese Arbeit befasst sich mit der Entwicklung optimierter Entwurfsverfahren für den Proportional-Integral-Observer und der Entwicklung und Anwendung beobachterbasierter Konzepte zur robusten Regelung nichtlinearer Systeme. In dieser Arbeit wird der modifizierte Advanced PIO (MAPIO) als erweiterte Version des Advanced PIO (APIO) eingeführt. Der Schätzfehler von MAPIO wird über ein Gütefunktional abgebildet. Das Gütefunktional wird durch Anpassung der Rückkopplungsverstärkungsmatrix an die Charakteristik der unbekannten Eingangsgröße minimiert. Die Performance der modifizierten Beobachterentwurfsansätze wird anhand eines praktischen Beispiels bewertet. Geschätzt wird eine unbekannte Kontaktkraft mit nichtlinearer Charakteristik, die auf ein mechanisches System wirkt. Anhand eines Simulationsbeispiels im offenen und geschlossenen Regelkreis wird die Performance von MAPIO gegenüber vorherigen Verfahren APIO und PIO verifiziert. Basierend auf der Idee des Funnel Reglers wird ein neuartiges Entwurfskonzept für den Proportional-Integral-Observer vorgestellt. Die Nachteile des PIO-Konzeptes mit hohem Verstärkungsfaktor können überwunden werden und Schätzungen schneller dynamischer Verhaltensweisen lassen sich realisieren. Der Vorteil der neuartigen Funnel PIO Methode ist, dass der Schätzfehler in einem definierten Bereich, der sogenannten Funnel-Area, verbleibt. In dieser Arbeit wird gezeigt, dass der vorgeschlagene Funnel PIO Algorithmus eine adaptive PIO Verstärkungsberechnung ermöglicht, die auch in Gegenwart von Messrauschen situativ eingestellt werden kann. Der Stabilitätsnachweis von Funnel PIO wird mittels der Lyapunov Theorie untersucht. Die Wirksamkeit der vorgeschlagenen Methode wird durch Simulation und experimentelle Ergebnisse validiert. Eine auf einen elastischen Balken wirkende äußere Kraft mit nichtlinearer Charakteristik wird geschätzt. Ein nichtlineares MIMO System wird verwendet, um die Wirksamkeit der vorgeschlagenen Methode im geschlossenen Regelkreis zu verifizieren. In dieser Arbeit werden zwei neue PI-Observer basierte robuste Regelungen (PIO-basierte Sliding Mode und PIO-basierte Backstepping Regelung) vorgestellt. Die Positionsregelung eines hydraulischen Differentialzylinders in Gegenwart von Modellunsicherheiten, Störungen und Messrauschen wird untersucht. Zur Anwendung der PIO-basierten Störgrößenschätzung wird eine Ein-/Ausgangs-Linearisierung des nichtlinearen Modells vorgenommen. Die Stabilität des geschlossenen Regelkreises wird in beiden Fällen mit der Lyapunov Theorie bewiesen. Die vorgeschlagenen Methoden werden experimentell validiert und die Ergebnisse werden mit dem Standard Sliding Mode Regler und einem P-Regler in Gegenwart von Messrauschen, Modellunsicherheiten und externen Störungen verglichen

Advances in Spacecraft Systems and Orbit Determination

"Advances in Spacecraft Systems and Orbit Determinations", discusses the development of new technologies and the limitations of the present technology, used for interplanetary missions. Various experts have contributed to develop the bridge between present limitations and technology growth to overcome the limitations. Key features of this book inform us about the orbit determination techniques based on a smooth research based on astrophysics. The book also provides a detailed overview on Spacecraft Systems including reliability of low-cost AOCS, sliding mode controlling and a new view on attitude controller design based on sliding mode, with thrusters. It also provides a technological roadmap for HVAC optimization. The book also gives an excellent overview of resolving the difficulties for interplanetary missions with the comparison of present technologies and new advancements. Overall, this will be very much interesting book to explore the roadmap of technological growth in spacecraft systems

Wind Turbine Reliability Improvement by Fault Tolerant Control

This thesis investigates wind turbine reliability improvement, utilizing model-based fault tolerant control, so that the wind turbine continues to operate satisfactorily with the same performance index in the presence of faults as in fault-free situations. Numerical simulations are conducted on the wind turbine bench mark model associated with the considered faults and comparison is made between the performance of the proposed controllers and industrial controllers illustrating the superiority of the proposed ones

Robust fault tolerant control of induction motor system

Research into fault tolerant control (FTC, a set of techniques that are developed to increase plant availability and reduce the risk of safety hazards) for induction motors is motivated by practical concerns including the need for enhanced reliability, improved maintenance operations and reduced cost. Its aim is to prevent that simple faults develop into serious failure. Although, the subject of induction motor control is well known, the main topics in the literature are concerned with scalar and vector control and structural stability. However, induction machines experience various fault scenarios and to meet the above requirements FTC strategies based on existing or more advanced control methods become desirable. Some earlier studies on FTC have addressed particular problems of 3-phase sensor current/voltage FTC, torque FTC, etc. However, the development of these methods lacks a more general understanding of the overall problem of FTC for an induction motor based on a true fault classification of possible fault types.In order to develop a more general approach to FTC for induction motors, i.e. not just designing specific control approaches for individual induction motor fault scenarios, this thesis has carried out a systematic research on induction motor systems considering the various faults that can typically be present, having either “additive” fault or “multiplicative” effects on the system dynamics, according to whether the faults are sensor or actuator (additive fault) types or component or motor faults (multiplicative fault) types.To achieve the required objectives, an active approach to FTC is used, making use of fault estimation (FE, an approach that determine the magnitude of a fault signal online) and fault compensation. This approach of FTC/FE considers an integration of the electrical and mechanical dynamics, initially using adaptive and/or sliding mode observers, Linear Parameter Varying (LPV, in which nonlinear systems are locally decomposed into several linear systems scheduled by varying parameters) and then using back-stepping control combined with observer/estimation methods for handling certain forms of nonlinearity.In conclusion, the thesis proposed an integrated research of induction motor FTC/FE with the consideration of different types of faults and different types of uncertainties, and validated the approaches through simulations and experiments

Integrating Vehicle Slip and Yaw in Overarching Multi-Tiered Automated Vehicle Steering Control to Balance Path Following Accuracy, Gracefulness, and Safety

Balancing path following accuracy and error convergence with graceful motion in steering control is challenging due to the competing nature of these requirements, especially across a range of operating speeds and conditions. This paper demonstrates that an integrated multi-tiered steering controller considering the impact of slip on kinematic control, dynamic control, and steering actuator rate commands achieves accurate and graceful path following. This work is founded on multi-tiered sideslip and yaw-based models, which allow derivation of controllers considering error due to sideslip and the mapping between steering commands and graceful lateral motion. Observer based sideslip estimates are combined with heading error in the kinematic controller to provide feedforward slip compensation. Path following error is compensated by a continuous Variable Structure Controller (VSC) using speed-based path manifolds to balance graceful motion and error convergence. Resulting yaw rate commands are used by a backstepping dynamic controller to generate steering rate commands. A High Gain Observer (HGO) estimates sideslip and yaw rate for output feedback control. Stability analysis of the output feedback controller is provided, and peaking is resolved. The work focuses on lateral control alone so that the steering controller can be combined with other speed controllers. Field results provide comparisons to related approaches demonstrating gracefulness and accuracy in different complex scenarios with varied weather conditions and perturbations