The balance beam: an instructional experiment in state feedback and observer design

Author

Shields, Joel ; Alvarez, Luis ; Horowitz, Roberto

Author_Institution

Dept. of Mech. Eng., California Univ., Berkeley, CA, USA

Volume

2

fYear

1997

fDate

10-12 Dec 1997

Firstpage

1972

Abstract

The balance beam as a device to assist in the instruction of automatic control courses is described. The system consists of two water tanks placed on the ends of a balance beam. The control objective is to move the beam to a given reference angle. The control action is provided by a pair of water pumps that can change the distribution of water between the tanks. A set of experiments are designed to help students conceptualize the tasks of modeling, system identification, the use of model linearization techniques, and the design of state feedback controllers and state observers

Keywords

control engineering education; control system synthesis; observers; spatial variables control; state feedback; student experiments; balance beam; educational experiment; instructional experiment; model linearization techniques; modeling; state feedback controller design; state observer design; system identification; water pumps; water tanks; Automatic control; Educational institutions; Laboratories; Laser excitation; Linear feedback control systems; Mechanical engineering; Open loop systems; Potentiometers; State feedback; System identification;

fLanguage

English

Publisher

ieee

Conference_Titel

Decision and Control, 1997., Proceedings of the 36th IEEE Conference on

Conference_Location

San Diego, CA

ISSN

0191-2216

Print_ISBN

0-7803-4187-2

Type

conf

DOI

10.1109/CDC.1997.657889

Filename

657889