Calculation of robustly relatively stabilizing PID controllers for linear time-invariant systems with unstructured uncertainty

Abstract

This article deals with the calculation of all robustly relatively stabilizing (or robustly stabilizing as a special case) Proportional-Integral-Derivative (PID) controllers for Linear Time-Invariant (LTI) systems with unstructured uncertainty. The presented method is based on plotting the envelope that corresponds to the trios of P-I-D parameters marginally complying with given robust stability or robust relative stability condition formulated by means of the H_∞ norm. Thus, this approach enables obtaining the region of robustly stabilizing or robustly relatively stabilizing controllers in a P-I-D space. The applicability of the technique is demonstrated in the illustrative examples, in which the regions of robustly stabilizing and robustly relatively stabilizing PID controllers are obtained for a controlled plant model with unstructured multiplicative uncertainty and unstructured additive uncertainty. Moreover, the method is also verified on the real laboratory model of a hot-air tunnel, for which two representative controllers from the robust relative stability region are selected and implemented.

Keywords: -infinity norm; PID controllers; Robust control; Robust performance; Robust relative stability; Robust stability; Unstructured uncertainty.