Design and implementation of an integrated experimental control platform using rapid control prototyping methods

This paper presents a framework for rapid experiment implementation in the field of automatic process control. Using the proposed solution, the real-time control experiment can be carried out easily and rapidly, realizing and validating all kinds of advanced control algorithms. MATLAB/Simulink is used for rapid algorithm development. Three different methods are presented for realizing the real-time control of the practical plant, which are called XPC, RTW and OPC. The performance and applicable occasions of the three methods are investigated and discussed. The implementation of the proposed real-time control platform is depicted. A quadruple-tank process control test rig is developed. With the proposed experimental control platform, newly created control algorithms can be prototyping and examined in the quadruple-tank process practically, instead of off-line simulation. In the last section of the paper, a control example is illustrated.