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PID control for two-wheeled inverted pendulum (WIP) system

Article · January 2015

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 PID Control for Two-Wheeled Inverted Pendulum (WIP) System

PID CONTROL FOR TWO-WHEELED INVERTED PENDULUM

(WIP) SYSTEM
Bogdan Grămescu, Constantin Niţu, Nguyen Su Phuong Phuc, Claudia Irina Borzea
University “POLITEHNICA”of Bucharest
313, Splaiul Independentei, 060042 – Bucharest, Romania
bogdan.gramescu@upb.ro , constantin.nitu@upb.ro

Abstract - The complexity of the inverted pendulum system has drawn the interest of many researchers
around the world. Its instability feature is a good example for a control engineer, with the purpose of
verifying the control theory. To verify this system, equilibrium can be maintained, being possible to do
the simulation using a method with a closed loop controller, such as LQR or PID.
The article presents the achievement of a two-wheeled inverted pendulum (WIP) system, having an open-
source development Arduino platform as control centre, which is programmed with Processing open-
source environment. With the purpose of optimizing the system operation, a Kalman filter is implemented
on the Arduino platform.

Keywords: Mechatronics, Inverted Pendulum, Arduino, Kalman Filter, Control Algorithm.

1. Introduction

The stabilization issue has been increasingly approached
in recent years, being found in a very vast application
range. One of the classical stabilization control issues is
the inverted pendulum. The process is nonlinear and
unstable, with a single input signal and several output
signals. The inverted pendulum presented in this article
is a two-wheeled inverted pendulum system.
The stabilization of the inverted pendulum represents a
basic model for the control of other similar processes,
such as: rocket takeoff, equilibration of heavy loaded
cranes, etc. In recent researches, the balancing of the
inverted pendulum has often been studied in the modern
control theories, such as fuzzy control, variable gain
control, nonlinear control and neural networks.
The main goal was to design a mechatronic system
consisting of an inverted pendulum articulated on the
wheels axis of a two-wheeled system, with constructive
solutions to correct the design errors of existent
products, and to simplify the realization of a control and
actuation system.
2. The structure of Two-Wheeled Inverted
Pendulum (WIP) System
The design principle was the following: the mechanical
components consisted of LEGO components, the centre
of gravity being chosen as high as possible in regard to
the axis of rotatio.

Figure 1: The structure of the two-wheeled inverted pendulum system

Besides these components used as support, the v3 control platform and an electronic block consisting
system also consists of motors (Lego NXT with 1:48 of L298 motor driver circuit, a DC-DC convertor with
integrated reduction gearbox and rotation transducer 3.3V DC, and a Bluetooth HC-05 communication
with 720 pulses per rotation), the Arduino Mega 2560 module for the connection with a computer system.

246 The Romanian Review Precision Mechanics, Optics & Mechatronics, 2015, Issue 48
 PID Control for Two-Wheeled Inverted Pendulum (WIP) System

Figure 2: The electronic block

The control system also integrates a GY-521
sensor based on MPU-6050. This one is used to provide
the necessary information to the control algorithm,
regarding angles, speeds and angular accelerations.
Thus, an inertial sensor had to be installed, being
necessary to read the data provided by this one, but also
to filter this data, in order to reduce noise and errors as
much as possible.
MPU-6050 is the first integrated 6 axis motion
tracking device that combines a 3 axis gyroscope, a 3
axis accelerometer, and a digital motion processor
(DMP), all in a small package, of 4mmx4mmx0.9mm.
The values received from MPU-6050 sensor are
transmitted to the Arduino development platform
through I2C interface.
3. The control program implemented on the
Arduino platform
Starting from the mathematical model necessary
for the implementation of the control algorithm, it was
possible to elaborate the control program of the system,
which was implemented in the Arduino Mega platform.
As programming environment, the open-source Arduino
software (IDE) was used, which uses Java programming
language that is based on Processing open-source
language.
The control algorithm for the inverted pendulum
system is similar to the one presented in figure 3

Figure 3: The control algorithm used for the robot

The entire control process is a closed loop, the
steps repeating with a predetermined frequency (figure
4). Initially, all parameters have to be declared and all
the necessary conditions have to be set for the following
steps. This first step of initialization is included in
setup() function of the program, and is passed through
once.
After passing through the first step, the program
will run a closed loop, at the end of each set of steps
being obtained the command for each motor. The loop
of the program implemented on Arduino platform is
loop() function. The PWM signal for each motor is
equal to the sum of the outputs of PID 1, respectively
PID 2 controllers, plus the output of PID 3 controller on
left motor, respectively minus the output of PID 3
controller on right motor, or vice versa. Depending on
the output reference of PID 1 controller, the entire
inverted pendulum structure can be controlled for
moving forwards or backwards. Depending on the
output reference of PID 3 controller, the structure can be
controlled so that to turn or rotate.
The frequency of passing through the loop is a
very important factor, with direct effect on the stability
level of the system. In figure 4, the main steps are
presented briefly, behind whom there are various other
steps such as: calibration of the signals received from
sensors, filtering these signals, communication with
computer, checking the battery level, etc.

The Romanian Review Precision Mechanics, Optics & Mechatronics, 2015, Issue 48 247
 PID Control for Two-Wheeled Inverted Pendulum (WIP) System

Figure 4: Main processing steps of the program implemented in the Arduino platform

Figure 5 presents the interface generated by the adjusted directly from here. By means of this program,
program. The upper part contains the graphics which the time necessary for the control process of the robot is
present interest, and the bottom part contains the significantly reduced.
parameters of the three PID controllers, that can be

Figure 5: The communication interface between Arduino platform and computer

248 The Romanian Review Precision Mechanics, Optics & Mechatronics, 2015, Issue 48
 PID Control for Two-Wheeled Inverted Pendulum (WIP) System

4. Implementation of Kalman filter on the Arduino platform

For the statistically optimum estimation of the state of
the basic system, the implementation of a Kalman filter
is very useful. This algorithm uses a series of
measurements observed in time, which contain noise
(random variations) and other inaccuracies, and realizes
estimations of the unknown variables that tend to be
more accurate than the ones based on a single
measurement. For the implementation of the filter on
the Arduino platform, the functional model has been
used, which was modified according to proper
necessities. The original source code [4] belongs to
Kristian Lauszus, cofounder of TKJ Electronics, an
enterprise in Denmark specialized in electronic
components and their applications.

The implementation steps of Kalman filter are:

Step 1: Predict a priori state.

(1)

In this case, the equation becomes:

(2)

Based on this equation, the code implemented in the Arduino platform is:

Step 2: Predict a priori error covariance.

(3)

In this case, the equation becomes:

(4)

Based on this equation, the code implemented on the Arduino platform is:

Step 3: Compute residual.

(5)

Based on this equation, the code implemented on the Arduino platform is:

Step 4: Compute [Sk] matrix.

(6)

The Romanian Review Precision Mechanics, Optics & Mechatronics, 2015, Issue 48 249
 PID Control for Two-Wheeled Inverted Pendulum (WIP) System

Based on this equation, the code implemented on the Arduino platform is:

Step 5: Compute Kalman gain [ ].

(7)

In this case, the equation becomes:

(8)

Based on this equation, the code implemented on the Arduino platform is:
In case S is a matrix, P cannot be divided by S, and therefore the inverse matrix has to be computed.

Step 6: Obtain a posteriori state estimate at k moment.

(9)
In this case, the equation becomes:
(10)

Based on this equation, the code implemented on the Arduino platform is:

Step 7: Obtain a posteriori error covariance estimate (final step).

(11)

In this case, the equation becomes:

(12)

A posteriori error covariance is reduced because the state estimation error has been diminished.

Based on this equation, the code implemented on the Arduino platform (the following variations being chosen for most
IMU) is:
Instead of Kalman filter, a complementary filter can be implemented:

250 The Romanian Review Precision Mechanics, Optics & Mechatronics, 2015, Issue 48
 PID Control for Two-Wheeled Inverted Pendulum (WIP) System

(13)

where the sum of the coefficients is 1. This filter is simpler, but less accurate, providing however good results when
used for simpler systems.

Figure 6: Graphics obtained in the following cases: unfiltered, filtered with Kalman Filter and filtered with
Complementary Filter

The information provided by gyroscope is 6. References

integrated by time and used to update the angular
position, the step by step increment being useful to
prevent that the drift occurs in time, characteristic for
the gyroscope. To assure enhanced disturbance
sensitivity, the information from accelerometer is also
used in a small amount.
5. Conclusions
The equilibrium of an inverted pendulum,
articulated on the wheels axis of a two wheeled system,
has been successfully maintained. Between two
controllers, PID and LQR, PID controller has been
chosen to realize the program implemented on the
Arduino platform.
Kalman filter has been successfully implemented.
The drift of the gyroscope was efficiently removed, so
that to allow an exact estimation of the inclination angle
and its drift, for the system. The program for the
registration of data provided by the inertial sensor and
for applying Kalman filter works properly. A greater
importance is given to the fact that data from the serial
port has been successfully received, and a control
algorithm has been elaborated on the basis of a
mathematical model, for which the program outputs have
been observed depending on various inclinations and
accelerations tested on the system structure, without
recording abnormal values or errors.
[1] Balancing a two-wheeled Autonomous Robot, Rich
Chi Ooi, School of Mechanical Engineering, The
University of Western Australia
[2] Advance Control of Wheeled Inverted Pendulum
System, Zhijun Li, College of Automation Science and
Engineering, South China University of Technology,
Chenguang Yang, School of Computing and
Mathematics, University of Plymouth, Plymouth, Devon,
UK, Liping Fan, Departament of Automation, Shanghai
Jiao Tong University Shanghai, People’s Republic of
China
[3] https://github.com/TKJElectronics/Example-
Sketch-for-IMU-including-Kalman-filter
[4] http://blog.tkjelectronics.dk/2012/09/a-practical-
approach-to-kalman-filter-and-how-to-implement-
it/comment-page-1/
[5] http://www.plethora-
project.com/education/2011/09/12/processing-tutorials/
[6] NXTway-GS Model-Based Design-Control of self-
balancing two-wheeled robot built with LEGO
Mindstorms NXT, Yorihisa Yamamoto, Aplication
Engineering, Applied Systems First Division,
CYBERNET SYSTEMS CO.,LTD.
[7] Progetto e implementazione del Sistema di
controllo per un pendolo inverso, Marco Triverio,
Departamento di Elettronica e Informazione, Corso di
Laurea in Ingegneria Informatica, Politehnico di Milano.

The Romanian Review Precision Mechanics, Optics & Mechatronics, 2015, Issue 48 251

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