As an alternative to both classical PID-type and modern model-based approaches to solving control problems, active disturbance rejection control (ADRC) has gained significant traction in recent years. With its simple tuning method and robustness against process parameter variations, it puts itself forward as a valuable addition to the toolbox of control engineering practitioners. This article aims at providing a single-source introduction and reference to linear ADRC with this audience in mind. A simulative study is carried out using generic first- and second-order plants to enable a quick visual assessment of the abilities of ADRC. Finally, a modified form of the discrete-time case is introduced to speed up real-time implementations as necessary in applications with high dynamic requirements.
In this study, an active disturbance rejection control (ADRC) toolbox for MATLAB/Simulink is introduced. Although ADRC has already been established as a powerful robust control framework with successful industrial implementations and strong theoretical foundations, a comprehensive tool for computer-aided design of ADRC has not been developed until now. The proposed open-source ADRC Toolbox is a response to the growing need in the scientific community and the control industry for a straightforward software application of the ADRC methodology. Its main purpose is to fill the gap between the curr…
This paper presents an active disturbance rejection control (ADRC) scheme with an improved fractional-order extended state observer (IFO-ESO).Based on the new ADRC scheme, the open-loop transfer function of a high-order system can be approximately rendered to a so-called Weighed Bode's ideal transfer function, whose closed-loop performance is less prone to the controller parameter variations. The design of the IFO-ESO helps reduce the number of system states to be estimated and improves the performance of closed-loop system over %the previously proposed the fractional-order active disturbance …
This paper presents an improved active disturbance rejection control scheme (IFO-ADRC) with an improved fractional-order extended state observer (IFO-ESO). The structural information of the system is utilized in IFO-ESO rather than buried as in the typical fractional-order extended state observer (FO-ESO) and help significantly improve the performance of IFO-ESO and closed-loop system. Compared with the integer-order active disturbance rejection controller (IO-ADRC), the auxiliary tracking controller of IFO-ADRC has a simpler form and fewer parameters need to be tuned. Frequency-domain analysi…
The increasing demand for target tracking, environmental surveys, surveillance and mapping requires multi-axis gimbal systems with high tracking and stabilization performance. In this paper, first, computed torque model is generated to estimate the complex disturbances acting on the system. Then, two different control strategies based on active disturbance rejection control (ADRC) and computed torque model are implemented on a two-axis gimbal system. The purpose is to improve the robustness, environmental adaptability and tracking accuracy of the system and reduce the tuning effort of ADRC by …
Considering the control problem for nonlinear uncertain systems, the tolerable range of uncertain control input gain is a fundamental issue. The paper presents the necessary and sufficient condition for the well-performed closed-loop system based on active disturbance rejection control (ADRC) design. Via the proposed necessary and sufficient condition, the maximum tolerable range of the uncertain control gain is quantitatively presented, which reveals the capability of ADRC to handle the uncertainties related with control input. Moreover, under the proposed necessary and sufficient condition, …
To foster the adoption of active disturbance rejection control (ADRC) and support its deployment even on low-cost embedded systems, this article introduces the most efficient implementation of linear discrete-time ADRC to date. While maintaining all features and the exact performance characteristics of the state-space form, computational efforts and storage requirements are reduced to a minimum compared to all existing implementations. This opens up new possibilities to use ADRC in applications with high sample rates, tight timing constraints, or low computational power.
A new tuning rule is introduced for linear active disturbance rejection control (ADRC), which results in similar closed-loop dynamics as the commonly employed bandwidth parameterization design, but with lower feedback gains. In this manner the noise sensitivity of the controller is reduced, paving the way for using ADRC in more noise-affected applications. It is proved that the proposed tuning gains, while rooted in the analytical solution of an algebraic Riccati equation, can always be obtained from a bandwidth parameterization design by simply halving the gains. This establishes a link betwe…
Active disturbance rejection control for unmanned tracked vehicles in leader-follower scenarios: discrete-time implementation and field test validation
Practical applications of controllers often impose further requirements on the implementation beyond the actual control performance, such as the ability to switch between manual and automatic control or between different control laws or controller parameter settings, known as bumpless transfer. Another common requirement is to limit the control signal in magnitude and/or rate. This article examines and extends several discrete-time variants of active disturbance rejection control (ADRC), which is increasingly being applied especially in the field of power electronics and drives, in this regard…
The performance of active disturbance rejection control (ADRC) algorithms can be limited in practice by high-frequency measurement noise. In this work, this problem is addressed by transforming the high-gain extended state observer (ESO), which is the inherent element of ADRC, into a new cascade observer structure. Set of experiments, performed on a DC-DC buck power converter system, show that the new cascade ESO design, compared to the conventional approach, effectively suppresses the detrimental effect of sensor noise over-amplification while increasing the estimation/control performance. Th…
In this work, an advanced motion controller is proposed for buck converter-fed DC motor systems. The design is based on an idea of active disturbance rejection control (ADRC) with its key component being a custom observer capable of reconstructing various types of disturbances (including complex, harmonic signals). A special formulation of the proposed design allows the control action to be expressed in a concise and practically appealing form reducing its implementation requirements. The obtained experimental results show increased performance of the introduced approach over conventionally us…
A suboptimal active disturbance rejection controller (S-ADRC) is proposed for second-order systems with unknown time-varying nonlinear dynamics. The output-feedback controller guarantees a global convergence to the vicinity of an optimal solution by means of dynamic control gains, based on the estimated main and extended state variables obtained through a high-gain observer. Three numerical examples compare the performance of the proposed control scheme applied to linear and nonlinear systems with that of a fixed-gain conventional ADRC as well as several model-based optimal and suboptimal cont…
The extended state observer (ESO) plays an important role in the design of feedback control for nonlinear systems. However, its high-gain nature creates a challenge in engineering practice in cases where the output measurement is corrupted by non-negligible, high-frequency noise. The presence of such noise puts a constraint on how high the observer gains can be, which forces a trade-off between fast convergence of state estimates and quality of control task realization. In this work, a new observer design is proposed to improve the estimation performance in the presence of noise. In particular…
King Fahd University of Petroleum and Minerals（法赫德石油和矿产大学）
In this work, the autonomous control of a quadrotor-manipulator unmanned aerial vehicle is treated using an extended dynamic model. Due to persistent aerodynamic disturbances and dynamic couplings, the control of a quadrotor-manipulator unit is cumbersome. Active disturbance rejection control (ADRC) is proposed for the cancellation of the undesirable dynamics while a PD controller is developed for set-point tracking. Parameters were tuned using Gradient Descent-Sequential Quadratic Programming in Simulink design optimization
Unmanned aerospace vehicles usually carry sensors (i.e., electro-optical and/or infrared imaging cameras) as their primary payload. These sensors are used for image processing, target tracking, surveillance, mapping, and providing high-resolution imagery for environmental surveys. It is crucial to obtain a steady image in all these applications. This is typically accomplished by using multi-axis gimbal systems. This paper concentrates on the modeling and control of a multi-axis gimbal system. A novel and fully outlined procedure is proposed to derive the nonlinear and highly coupled Equations …
