Practical design of real time VSS applied for flexibal robot

In robust control, variable structure system (VSS) theory is appreciated to design control under heavy uncertainties. In this paper authors present controlling a flexible robot arm driven by pneumatic artificial rubber muscles (Parms) with direct transmission. The sliding modes control (SMC) is a special case of VSS. Usually in the SMC, the equivalent control is associated with high frequency control to reduce chattering. Amongst the latter, those applied are the twisting and the super twisting algorithms, which belong to the 2-high order sliding control set. In this paper we focus on the relevance of such an equivalent control based on truly uncertain model. Also It will be shown the effect of a noised sensor signal on the control performances, the use of an additional discontinuous term, which increases performance and stability. Experimental results are presented and discussed.