Research Article

Advances in Mechanical Engineering

2016, Vol. 8(10) 1–13
Ó The Author(s) 2016
Dynamic tracking performance of DOI: 10.1177/1687814016671443
aime.sagepub.com
servo mechanisms based on compound
controller

Nuan Wen1, Zhenghua Liu1, Fang Zhang2 and Yan Ren3

Abstract
This article provides systematic analysis and controller design methods for dynamic tracking performance of servo
mechanisms associated with practical systems. Discrete general composite nonlinear feedback, as a fundamental control-
ler, will be proposed to yield a good transient performance. Particularly, in the servo systems, there also exist unmo-
deled disturbances which may lead to tracking errors. A novel repetitive control scheme based on disturbance observer
configuration is incorporated into the controller to counteract this unexpected effect. Furthermore, to deal with any
periodic signal of variable frequency, a fractional-order repetitive control scheme based on disturbance observer strategy
is proposed. The stability of the overall closed-loop system is guaranteed via frequency domain analysis. Three control-
lers, that is, the proportional–derivative controller with zero-phase error tracking controller scheme and the conven-
tional disturbance observer, the integral backstepping controller, and the compound discrete general composite
nonlinear feedback controller with fractional-order repetitive control scheme based on disturbance observer are com-
pared. To demonstrate the dynamic tracking performance of the proposed control strategy, comparative experiments
are conducted.

Keywords
Servomechanisms, dynamic tracking performance, repetitive control, composite nonlinear feedback control, fractional
order

Date received: 29 May 2016; accepted: 5 September 2016

Academic Editor: Anand Thite

Introduction stability of the system. As an effective feedforward

design approach, zero-phase error tracking controller
Dynamic tracking has become one of the most signifi- (ZPETC) counteracts the closed-loop poles and the
cant performances of servo controlling systems. This cancellable zeros of the control plant to turn the gain
indispensable servo technique is used in a wide variety
of high-performance mechatronic systems, including a
1
typical hard disk drive,1 a nanopositioning stage,2 an School of Automation Science and Electrical Engineering, Beihang
University, Beijing, China
XY-table positioning mechanism,3 and a hydraulic 2
School of Economics and Management, Beihang University, Beijing,
servo system.4 Over the past decades, the existing China
researches are focused on the design of feedforward 3
School of Information Engineering, Inner Mongolia University of Science
controller to improve the dynamic performance of and Technology, Baotou, China
servo systems.5 Instead of altering the stability, a feed-
Corresponding author:
forward controller provides the overall system with spe- Nuan Wen, School of Automation Science and Electrical Engineering,
cific frequency tracking characteristics. In addition, a Beihang University, Beijing 100191, China.
closed-loop controller is essential to guarantee the Email: max_buaa3@163.com

Creative Commons CC-BY: This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License
(http://www.creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/) which permits any use, reproduction and distribution of the work without
further permission provided the original work is attributed as specified on the SAGE and Open Access pages (https://us.sagepub.com/en-us/nam/
open-access-at-sage).
2 Advances in Mechanical Engineering
into the unit circle at low frequencies, and at the same
time, eliminates phase error induced by non-cancellable
zeros at all frequencies.6 To ensure the anticipated per-
formance of ZPETC, it is indispensable to acquire the
precise model of the plant system. However, servo
mechanisms may have a large extent of nonlinear
uncertainties such as nonlinear friction and the large
change of payload. Therefore, the tracking perfor-
mance of ZPETC may be deteriorated by parameter
perturbations and external disturbances.
Improving transient performance plays a crucial role
in tracking dynamic external signals. Compared to con-
ventional approaches, an intelligent nonlinear control
technique, the so-called composite nonlinear feedback
(CNF) control, is capable of performing track following
with much better result. The CNF control, which is
rooted in the article of Lin et al.,7 consists of a linear
feedback law and a nonlinear feedback law. The linear
feedback part is designed to yield a closed-loop system
with a small damping ratio for a quick response. The
nonlinear feedback law, on the other hand, is supposed
to increase the damping ratio of the closed-loop system
as the system output approaches the target reference.
This transformation of system can reduce the overshoot
caused by the linear part. Chen et al.8 developed the
CNF control technique for more general linear systems
with input saturation. In the most previous forms of the
CNF control technique, the target reference has always
been assumed to be a step signal. In particular, Cheng
et al.9 adopted a reference generator which produces
more general signals to supplement the CNF control
technique. Thus, it can yield a good performance for
tracking general non-step references. Moreover, in the
current digital control systems, a controller designed in
continuous-time domain eventually has to be discre-
tized for implementation. It seems more efficient to
design controllers directly in the discrete-time domain
whenever possible. However, the existing studies hardly
focus on tracking more general reference signals via
CNF control strategy for a class of discrete-time
systems.
Friction, as the main source of torque disturbance,
occurs unavoidably in direct-driving servo mechanical
systems. Thus, there is a wide recognition that in order
to achieve better tracking performance, it is essential to
design compensatory components which can inhibit the
effect of frictional disturbance. The conventional dis-
turbance observer (DOB) becomes one of most effective
ways to restrain the internal and external distur-
bance,10,11 which will enhance the rigidity of servo
mechanism eventually. However, due to the low-pass
Q-Filter, the compensations of DOB usually result in
magnitude distortions and phase lags when confronted
with periodic inputs. Therefore, with regard to the
dynamic tracking, the conventional DOB fails to com-
pensate for specific disturbances.
However, providing that these disturbances, espe-
cially friction, have periodic and repetitive characteris-
tics, then the compensation schemes become much
easier to design. Actually, all state variables as well as
disturbances in direct current (DC) servo mechanisms
have the same repetitive period as that of repetitive
external command, and then, the stated assumption
becomes reasonable. As a consequence, repetitive con-
trol (RC) is very effective to attenuate these periodic
disturbances. Distinguished by its high performance as
well as the simple design and implementation criteria,
RC improves the periodic tracking performance12,13 by
implementing zN (N is the period of the disturbance/
reference) into the feedback loop or the feedforward
loop. Then, the errors in the previous repetition can be
reused to improve the current control. However,
because of its strict stability condition and poor
response to non-periodic disturbances, conventional
RC fails to be applied in practice. Recently, a new
structural configuration of disturbance of observer in
RC (RDOB), wherein designers have more flexibility in
the repetitive loop-shaping design, is developed in Chen
and Tomizuka14 and Li et al.15 The proposed RDOB is
an approach to extract the repetitive errors in feedback
control, leading to a great decline in gain amplifications
at the non-repetitive frequencies. An additional benefit
of the scheme is that just like the design procedure of
conventional DOB, the fundamental feedback control-
ler and RDOB can be designed separately without any
interference.
Unfortunately, the period of the disturbance or ref-
erence (N = fs =fr ), where fr is the fundamental fre-
quency of the reference signal and fs is the sampling
rate, may be fractional in the case of a fixed sampling
rate fs . As it is known, only Z N with an integer N can
be implemented in practice. Failing to compensate the
exact fractional period signals, the conventional struc-
ture of RDOB14,15 is insufficient to track arbitrary fre-
quency external signal or eliminate any periodic
disturbance.16,17 In other words, with the fixed sam-
pling rate, the former RDOB would lead to significant
performance degradation in practice.
In this article, by borrowing ideas from general CNF
and RC based on DOB structure and integrating them
with some assumptions, a new compound controller is
proposed. It can adapt to arbitrary frequency signals
for a high-accuracy flight simulator system driven by
DC motors. To verify the high performance of the pro-
posed controller, extensive comparative experimental
results have been obtained from the motion control of
a DC motor. The distinctive characteristics of this work
are as follows:
1. Unlike the general CNF designed in continuous-
time domain,9 the general CNF based on
discrete-time domain which is more practical is
Wen et al. 3

proposed to yield good performance in tracking

dynamic signal. And the explicit design proce-
dure is given in the following.
2. The RDOB strategy was first proposed by Chen
and Tomizuka.14 It differs from the control
scheme,18 which just combines the conventional
DOB and RC controller separately (both the
phase lag problem of DOB and undesired gain
amplifications of RC may occur in reality). The
novelty of RDOB is the flexible structure of RC
presented in DOB configuration. However, in
the existing literatures, the order N of RDOB
has to be an integer, which limits the implemen-
tation of RDOB in practical engineering. In this
article, the proposed fractional RDOB can effec-
tively overcome this adverse limitation.

This article is organized as follows. Problem formu-

lation and dynamic models are presented in section
‘‘Introduction.’’ Section ‘‘Problem formulation’’ gives
the discrete general composite nonlinear feedback Figure 1. Architecture of a three-axis flight simulator.
(DGCNF) controller design procedure and the new
structure of FRDOB, and the stability analysis is also
presented in this section. Experimental setup and com-
parative results are presented in section ‘‘Compound
control scheme.’’ Section ‘‘Conclusion’’ contains the
conclusions.

Problem formulation
A flight simulator, as being a kind of servo mechanism
with high accuracy in position tracking, has been
widely used in modern engineering system. As shown
in Figure 1, a complex flight motion simulator is cur-
rently composed of an orthogonal outer axis frame, a
middle-axis frame which is horizontal to the outer axis,
and an inner-axis frame supported by the middle-axis
frame. The inner axis is driven by a DC motor that is
fixed onto the center of the middle frame. In practice,
in order to achieve dynamic tracking performance,
both the outer- and middle-axis frames have to be
designed largely enough to be consistent with more
powerful motors. Whereas, the inner axis frames can
not be manufactured large enough for the reason that
the middle-axis frames fail to endure overweight load.
In consequence, the inner-axis frame, with the less
powerful motor but the greater force of friction, has
trouble behaving well in frequency tracking.
Considerations should be given priority to the inner-
axis frame.
The architecture of the inner-axis frame is described
by Figure 2. It is a current-controlled permanent-mag-
net DC motor with an analog amplified driver.
The equation of dynamic plant model in the inner-
axis frame is described as19
Figure 2. Architecture of the inner-axis frame.
J €u =  Bp u_ + u + f (u, u,
_ t) ð1Þ
where u and J represent the angular displacement and
the inertia load, respectively. Bp represents the viscous
friction coefficient and f represents other unmodeled
disturbances, such as nonlinear friction and external dis-
turbances. u is the control input voltage. Equation (1)
can be rewritten into a state-space form as follows
x_ 1 = x2
Bp 1 ð2Þ
x_ 2 =  x2 + u + d(x, t)
J J
where x = (x1 , x2 )T represents the state vector of the
position and velocity and d represents the lumped
disturbance.
At the same time, being ignored of unstructured
uncertainties, the nominal model of the plant can be
expressed as follows
4 Advances in Mechanical Engineering
1 r = a sin (2pft). Consider an auxiliary plant character-
P(s) = ð3Þ
Js2 + Bp s
where J and Bp could be obtained approximately by
open-loop system identification.20 But as for d, the pre-
cise modeling of disturbance is challenging and diffi-
cult.21 To eliminate the effects of disturbance and
achieve highly precise motion control, significant efforts
have been devoted to compensation strategy.
Given the approximate second-order plant, our aim
is to synthesize a control input u to make the state vec-
tor x track the dynamic signal as precisely as possible
in spite of parameter uncertainties or unstructured non-
linear uncertainties.
Compound control scheme
Fundamental feedback controller design
In order to achieve the fundamental servo performance
and robustness, a feedback controller has to be
designed. Instead of using conventional proportional–
integral–derivative (PID) or Sliding Mode Control
scheme, a unique variable structure control strategy
DGCNF is adopted to yield a good performance for
the second-order servo model mentioned above. By
altering the damping ratio of the overall closed-loop
system corresponding to the error, the proposed con-
troller can perform well in quick response and succeed
to reduce overshoot as well. It is a necessary character-
istic for tracking dynamic signal. The proposed
DGCNF is consisted of an auxiliary reference genera-
tor and a discrete CNF control scheme.
Specifically, a typical discrete second-order servo
model is characterized by
X  x(k + 1) = Ax(k) + Bs½u(k)
: ð4Þ
y(k + 1) = Cx(k)
P
where x 2 R2 , y 2 R, and u 2 R are the state, control
output, and control input, respectively. A, B, and C are
appropriate dimensional constant matrices that can be
obtained by discretization of equation (2), and s repre-
sents the actuator saturation defined as
s½u = sgn(u) minfumax , jujg ð5Þ
with umax being the saturation level of the input (umax
usually equals 10 V in practical servo controller). In the
same way, A, B, and C in the practical servo system can
be recognized that
1. (A, B) is stabilizable.
2. (A, B, C) is invertible and has no invariant zeros
at z = 1.
The reference generator, based on equation (4), is
constructed to generate any sinusoidal signal such as
ized by
X  xe (k + 1) = Axe (k) + Bue (k) , xe (0) = xe0
:
r(k) = Cxe (k)
ð6Þ
aux
where xe 2 R2 , r 2 R, and ue 2 R are the state, control
output, and control input, respectively. r is the refer-
ence produced to be tracked. A, B, and C are the same
as equation (4).
Next, we design a linear control law for the auxiliary
system as follows
ue (k) = Fe xe (k) ð7Þ
where Fe is the feedback gain matrix that can transform
the shape of equation (6).
The auxiliary system (6) and the linear control law
(7) are combined to form the final reference generator
as follows
(
X xe (k + 1) = (A + BFe )xe (k) , xe (0) = xe0
: ue (k) = Fe xe (k) ð8Þ
ref r(k) = Cxe (k)
The reference generator (8) can generate an arbitrary
type of sine signal r(k) = a sin (2pfr k) by setting the ini-
tial value xe0 = ½0 2pf T and choosing appropriate Fe .
The proof of this is involved with matrix function calcu-
lation method, and the similar design procedure can be
found.9
Then, let ^x(k) = x(k)  xe (k), equation (9) can be
obtained as
^x(k + 1) = A^x(k) + B(s½u(k)  ue (k)) ð9Þ
This equation will be used in the design of the
DGCNF control law. The following design procedure
will be carried out in three steps similar to Chen et al.8
Step 1: Design a linear feedback law
UL (k) = F^x(k) + ue (k) ð10Þ
In this step, F is designed by two main principles.
First, the stability of the overall system must be guaran-
teed, and then, the closed-loop poles should be placed
to have a dominating pair with a small damping ratio.
It will in turn yield a fast rise time in the closed-loop
system response. This procedure corresponds with the
conventional proportional–derivative (PD) control
design.
Step 2: Design a nonlinear feedback law
Furthermore, as A + BF is asymptotically stable,
there exist an positive define matrix W 2 R2 3 2 and a
Wen et al.
Figure 3. Block diagram of the RDOB scheme.
symmetric matrix P (P.0) that satisfies the following
Lyapunov equation
P = (A + BF)T P(A + BF) + W ð11Þ
The nonlinear feedback portion of the DGCNF con-
trol law UN is given by
UN (k) = rBT P(A + BF)^x(k) ð12Þ
where r is a nonpositive scalar with a limitation
jrj  2(BT PB)1 , and it is used to change the system
closed-loop damping ratio as the output approaches
the target reference.
Step 3: The linear feedback control law and non-
linear feedback portion derived in the previous steps
are now combined to form a DGCNF control law
u(k) = UL (k) + UN (k) ð13Þ
The DGCNF control law comprising the reference
generator (8) and the modified enhanced CNF control
law (13) will drive system output y to track arbitrary
reference r asymptotically. The proof will be discussed
in the end of this section.
Modified repetitive controller design
As mentioned above, the design of DGCNF assumes
that there is no disturbance in the model. When the
given system does have disturbances, the system output
under DGCNF control generally cannot track the sinu-
soidal reference precisely. In the case of practical servo
mechanism, there are always some disturbances, such
as friction and bias torques. In this section, a newly
developed repetitive strategy RDOB is adopted to com-
pensate or counteract disturbance.
As shown in Figure 3, the ingenious feature of
RDOB is that the novel repetitive configuration based
on DOB aims at maintaining e(k) small by shaping the
transfer function. And the flexible form of Q(z1 ) is
concentrated on extracting only periodical disturbance
component. Compared with conventional DOB
5
Figure 4. Block diagram of the DOB scheme.
Figure 5. Equivalent structure of Figure 3.
structure in Figure 4, Figure 3 has two main distinc-
tions. First, the transfer function from r(k) to e(k) has
changed. Second, the filter Q(z1 ) plays a role in
extracting the repetitive signal instead of being a low-
pass filter.
An infinite impulse response (IIR) Q(z1 ) filter is
applied to satisfy the property
(1  a)z(N m)
Q(z1 ) = ð14Þ
1  azN
where a 2 (0, 1) and m represent the relative order of
P(z1 ).
To explore the proposed scheme more thoroughly,
the block diagram can be transformed into Figure 5.
In forward channel of the diagram, there exists
1=1  Q(z1 )zm . We can obtain that
1  zN
1  Q(z1 )zm = ð15Þ
1  azN
Therefore, under the specific frequency,
1  Q(z1 )zm equals to zero for containing 1  zN ,
which provides the overall system with more enhanced
gain. By tuning the variable of a, the gain can be chan-
ged as well. As a consequence, RDOB is especially
advantageous when tracking the periodical signal.
Unfortunately, however, the period N is permanently
assumed to be an integer.14,15 In digital control system,
when the sample rate fs is fixed, N may be fractional
for the arbitrary fr . The delay module zN , due to the
fractional N, cannot be achieved in practice. In this
work, a fractional-order delay filter22 is adopted, which
6 Advances in Mechanical Engineering

can alleviate the mismatch of substitution for the frac-
tional N. Based on the principle of finite impulse
response (FIR) filter, fractional delay can be well
approximated by the given filter with integer orders.
Let Z N = Z Ni F with Ni being the maximum integer
but less than N and F (0  F\1) being the fractional
part of N. Z F can be approximated by a Lagrange
interpolation polynomial FIR filter as follows23
X
n
Z F ’ Ak zk
k =0
implemented in real-time applications but also offer
high approximation accuracy in most cases.
In this work, with the consideration of computa-
tional complexity and approximate precision, n is
equaled to 3. Then, equation (18) is obtained as follows
zN ’ A0 zNi + A1 z(Ni + 1) + A2 z(Ni + 2) + A3 z(Ni + 3)
ð18Þ
Moreover, from equations (14) and (18), the final
ð16Þ form of Q(z1 ) can be rewritten as

(1  a)A0 z(Ni m) + (1  a)A1 z(Ni m + 1) + (1  a)A2 z(Ni m + 2) + (1  a)A3 z(Ni m + 3)

Qf (z1 ) = ð19Þ
1  aA0 zNi  aA1 z(Ni + 1)  aA2 z(Ni + 2)  aA3 z(Ni + 3)
Combining equations (15) and (18) yields

1  A0 zNi  A1 z(Ni + 1)  A2 z(Ni + 2)  A3 z(Ni + 3)

1  zm Qf (z1 ) = ð20Þ
1  aA0 zNi  aA1 z(Ni + 1)  aA2 z(Ni + 2)  aA3 z(Ni + 3)
To investigate the performance of Qf (z1 ) and the
where k = 0, 1, . . . , n and the coefficient Ak can be precise approximation of fractional-order delay filter,
obtained as the magnitude responses of Qf (z1 ) and 1  zm Qf (z1 )
are plotted in Figures 6 and 7.
Y
n
Fi As shown above, Qf (z1 ) behaves as a spectral selec-
Ak = k, i = 0, 1, . . . , n ð17Þ tion filter to preserve only the specific repetitive compo-
ki
i=0
i6¼k nents. Correspondingly, 1  zm Qf (z1 ) works as a
band-stop filter to enhance the gain at the given fre-
Moreover, Lagrange interpolation is one of the quency point. Moreover, increasing a yields the magni-
easiest ways to design a fractional-order delay filter. tude responses of Qf (z1 ) with a sharper filter function
The coefficient of equation (17) for the assumed filter and provides 1  zm Qf (z1 ) with a sharper comb-like
only consumes a small number of additions and multi- magnitude response as well.
plications. Therefore, fractional-order delay filter based Furthermore, as the FRDOB produces high gain at
on Lagrange interpolation can not only be easily specific frequencies, it may amplify the mismatch

Figure 6. Magnitude responses of 1  zm Qf (z1 ) and Qf (z1 ) Figure 7. Magnitude responses of 1  zm Qf (z1 ) and Qf (z1 )
with a = 0:9131 m = 1, fs = 1000 Hz, fr = 11 Hz, and with a = 0:3669 m = 1, fs = 1000 Hz, fr = 5 Hz, and N = 200
N ’ 90:9091 are used as an illustrative example. are used as an illustrative example.
Wen et al. 7

between the actual P(z1 ) and nominal plant Pn (z1 ).

Eventually, it will lead to the controller output chatter-
ing dramatically. Therefore, a zero-phase low-pass filter
needs to be introduced as follows
2
(1 + z1 ) (1 + z)2
q(z1 ) = ð21Þ
16
The practically implemented Qp (z1 ) can be written
as
      Figure 8. Block diagram of the proposed scheme.
Qp z1 = Qf z1 znq 3 znq q z1 ð22Þ

where nq is the delay term to make q(z1 ) realizable,

and here nq = 2.       1   1    
D(z) = 1 + Cfb z1 P z1 + P1
n z P z  zm Qp z1
Stability and robust stability ð26Þ
To prove the convergence of DGCNF, we can combine Basically, the overall closed-loop stability can be
the previous demonstration.9,24 The process of proof is assured by checking whether the roots of the character-
essentially the same as conventional CNF. The istics equation (26) lie within the unit circle. However,
DGCNF controller output (13) will drive system- the approach of frequency domain analysis may be
controlled output y(k) to track sinusoidal reference r(k) more efficient.
asymptotically. To avoid repetition, it is not described Equation (26) can be rewritten as
in this article. The emphasis will be put on the stable
criteria of the overall system with the fundamental     
D(z) = 1 + Cfb z1 P z1
feedback controller DGCNF and FRDOB.  
The expected DGCNF controller output can be P1 1 1
n ðz ÞPðz Þ  z
m
)Qp ðz1 Þ
3 1+
express as 1 + Pðz1 ÞCfb ðz1 Þ
ð27Þ
u(k) = UL (k) + UN (k)
In equation (27), 1 + Cfb (z1 )P(z1 ) can be stable
= F^x + ue + rBT P(A + BF)^x ð23Þ
  by designing the reasonable Cfb (z1 ). Then, the stabi-
= F + rBT P(A + BF) ^x + ue lity of the overall closed-loop system depends on the
second term of equation (27). According to the Small
Furthermore, equation (23) can be rewritten as
Gain Theorem,25 the stability condition can be
  obtained
u(k) = F + rBT P(A + BF) (x  xe ) + Fe xe ð24Þ
 1 1  
where xe can be considered definitely as the reference  Pn (z )P(z1 )  zm Qp ðz1 Þ
  \1 ð28Þ
 1 + Pðz1 ÞC ðz1 Þ 
vector which is consisted of command of position and fb ‘
command of velocity.
On observation, we can regard the DGCNF control Robust stability can also be analyzed by applying
law (24) as a compound algorithm composed of a novel Small Gain Theorem when there exists perturbation
variable PD strategy and a feedforward controller that Dp (z) in the plant P(z1 ).
can improve tracking performance to some extent. By computing the sensitivity function
Performing the block diagram transformations in S(z1 ) = (∂F(z1 )=∂P(z1 ))(P(z1 )=F(z1 )), the comple-
Figure 3, we obtain an ultimate form of the overall sys- mentary sensitivity function can be given as
tem in Figure 8.    
From Figure 8, the closed-loop transfer function T z1 = 1  S z1
from r(k) to y(k) can be derived as ∂Fðz1 Þ Pðz1 Þ
=1 
  ∂Pðz1 Þ Fðz1 Þ ð29Þ
Cfb + Cff + P1
n Qp  z
m
Cff Qp P  
F(z) =   ð25Þ Cfb + P1
1  zm Qp + Cfb + P1 n Qp P
n Qp P =  
1  zm Qp + Cfb + P1n Qp P
where the feedforward controller does not affect the
stability. And the characteristic polynomial of the The robust stability condition can be achieved as the
closed-loop transfer function can be obtained as following condition is satisfied
8 Advances in Mechanical Engineering
Figure 9. Test platform.
Figure 10. Frequency characteristics between the actual plant
and the nominal model.
  1   1  
T z Dp z ()  1 ð30Þ
‘
A factual example of stability and robust stability
analysis will be provided in Figures 11 and 12.
Experimental validation
Experimental setup
To demonstrate the applicability of the proposed
method, an actual flight simulator system is employed
as the test platform, which is shown in Figure 9. It con-
sists of an inner-axis rotary actuator, a digital control
system, and a DC pulse-width-modulated (PWM)
amplifier.
The rotary sensor of the device uses the encoder of
Heidenhain ECN125 whose accuracy is about 6 2000 .
The proposed control algorithms are implemented via
a C ++ language based on Windows-RTX real-time
system on an industrial computer (E5300 2.8-GHz).
The velocity is acquired by backward difference of a
high-accuracy position signal. The sampling interval is
1.0 ms.
System identification
Using the method of frequency domain identification,
the nominal model can be identified as
1
P(s) = ð31Þ
0:0005s2 + 0:006s
The distinctions of frequency characteristics between
the actual plant and the nominal model are shown in
Figure 10.
From Figure 10, there are extreme mismatches in
amplitude–frequency and phase–frequency characteris-
tics at both low frequency and high frequency. These
uncertainties will definitely cause difficulties in achiev-
ing desired control performance.
Design of controllers
The following three controllers are compared:
1. PD + DOB + ZPETC: This compound con-
trol strategy is commonly used in servo system.
It consists of three components, a PD feedback
controller, a DOB as the compensation of fric-
tion, and a ZPETC as the feedforward control-
ler. The details of this control structure can be
found.26 At the end, the parameters are set as
Kp = 0:8 and Kd = 0:02, and t of the DOB is
chosen as 0.015.
2. Integral backstepping: As a nonlinear control-
ler, backstepping control with integral function
can improve the system tracking response and
bandwidth in some degree. The design proce-
dure of this control scheme can be found,27 and
the parameters are set as c1 = 180:0, c2 = 180:0,
and l1 = 2:0.
Wen et al. 9

Figure 11. (a) Stability and (b) robust stability when the external signal at 5 Hz.

Experimental results
Step Algorithm process
The three controllers are first tested for two specified
1. Initialization sinusoidal trajectories in 5 and 11 Hz, that is, the track-
2. Set constant matrixes A, B, F, and P of DGCNF ing command signals are employed as r = 0:5 sin
3. Confirm the frequency of the external dynamic signal (2p  5t) and r = 0:5 sin (2p  11t). Then, N is an integer
4. Compute the integer Ni and the fractional part F
5. According to equations (19), (21), and (22), and a fraction, respectively. The illustrations for stabi-
acquire the form of Qp lity and robust stability of the closed-loop system are
6. {main loop} analyzed as follows. With the parameter of DGCNF r
7. for i = 1 to m do varies in ½2(BT PB)1 , 0, the magnitude responses of
8. uQp =Pn (i) ( fe(i) !Qp (z1 )=Pn (z1 )g equations (28) and (30) present dramatic changes.
9. uQp =zm (i) ( fu1 (i) !Qp (z1 )zm g However, magnitudes are obviously lower than zero,
10. ufb (i) ( fe(i) ! Cfb (z1 )g and then, the stability and robust stability can be
  guaranteed.
where Cfb (z1 ) = F + r(i)BT P(A + BF) (x(i)  xe (i))
11. uff (i) ( fr(i) ! Cff (z1 )g, where Cff (z1 ) = Fe xe (i) The compared tracking errors of the three control-
12. u1 (i) ( uQp =Pn (i) + uQp =zm (i) + ufb (i) lers are shown in Figure 13. It shows that the proposed
13. uk (i) ( u1 (i) + uff (i) FRDOB + DGCNF controller performs extremely
14. End for better than PD + DOB + ZPETC controller and
15. Return uk (i) integral backstepping controller in terms of tracking
accuracy at both 5 and 11 Hz: the maximum tracking
errors decrease to 0.000568 with the help of
FRDOB + DGCNF. The precision raises two orders
3. FRDOB + DGCNF: The overall structure of of magnitude in the proposed schemes.
the proposed algorithm is depicted in Figure 8. To further show the robustness of the proposed
And according to Figure 8, the procedure of the strategy contrast to the previous methods, an unba-
algorithm is established as follows: lanced payload is installed on the inner axis. The condi-
tion is shown in Figure 14; the payload is about
where r =  0:2(BT PB)1 (2=p) arctan (  0:2 jje(k)= 6.6 pounds.
e(k  1)j  1j). And Fe varies according to the com- The comparative performance is illustrated in
mand signal. In the filter of FRDOB Qp , a = 0:999N . Figure 15. In the case of extra payload, the tracking
10 Advances in Mechanical Engineering

Figure 12. (a) Stability and (b) robust stability when the external signal at 11 Hz.

Figure 13. Control performance of the three control strategies: (a) 5 Hz and (b) 11 Hz.

error of the proposed FRDOB + DGCNF controller remains almost unchanged in tracking dynamic signal
can be limited within a small level. It is also found in at 5 and 11 Hz. Particularly, with the increase in the
Figure 16(e) and (f), regardless of the additional pay- signal frequency, the errors of those two control
load, the proposed FRDOB + DGCNF scheme schemes increase obviously.
Wen et al.
Figure 14. Inner axis is installed with an unbalanced payload.
The strong robustness of the proposed scheme can
be explained by two primary factors: first, DGCNF
scheme is essentially a PID mode algorithm; therefore,
Figure 15. Control performance of the three control strategies with payload: (a) 5 Hz and (b) 11 Hz.
11
it is unsusceptible to the uncertainties of the model.
Concentrating on the input and output, it contributes
to diminish error. Second, the filter Qp with a function
of low-pass makes a contribution that P1 n PQp  z
m
in
equation (29) is insignificant for robustness.
In addition, the tracking performance of the pro-
posed control scheme is compared with the pre-existing
RDOB3 to demonstrate the effectiveness of the frac-
tional filter. When the external signal is 11 Hz, the order
of N in equation (14) is fractional (1000/11). The com-
parative performance is illustrated in Figure 17. Due to
the inexact fractional order, the conventional RDOB
fails to compensate the periodical error or disturbance
in appropriate discrete-time point. However, by numer-
ical approximation with fractional order, the proposed
FRDOB can eliminate the mismatch to a great extent.
Conclusion
In this article, a DGCNF combined with repetitive con-
troller based on DOB form is proposed for dynamic
tracking servo system. The developed controller has the
property of improving transient performance without
too much overshoot which mainly derives from CNF
technique. The FRDOB, with the fractional delay filter,
has an advanced improvement of rejecting any periodic
disturbance or tracking arbitrary repetitive external sig-
nal. The stability as well as robustness of this controller
is guaranteed via frequency domain analysis. The illus-
trative experiments demonstrate the effectiveness of the
12 Advances in Mechanical Engineering

no payload time (s)

payload

Figure 16. Comparison of tracking error with and without the payload: (a), (c), and (e) 5 Hz and (b), (d), and (f) 11 Hz.

Figure 17. Comparison of tracking performance of FRDOB and RDOB: (a and b) with payload and (c and d) without payload.
Wen et al.
proposed controller. The performance limitations of
traditional PD + DOB + ZPETC and integral back-
stepping in servo systems are experimentally investi-
gated, while the proposed controller could overcome
these limitations and improve the dynamic tracking per-
formance effectively.
Declaration of conflicting interests
The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with
respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this
article.
Funding
The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial sup-
port for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this
article: This work was partly supported by the grants of
National Natural Science Foundation of China (No.
61563041) and Inner Mongolia Natural Science Foundation
(No. 2015MS0603).
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