MAE 4421: Control of Mechanical and

Aerospace Systems
Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering
Spring 2015
Homework 2
1) Use block diagram manipulations and simplifications to derive the closed-loop transfer function,
() = ()/() for each of the following systems. Show your work, including all intermediate
simplified block diagrams, along with explanations of the simplifications you make.
a)

b)

c)

2)

Create a signal flow graph for each of the block diagrams from problem 1, and then use Masons
rule to determine the closed loop transfer function for each system.

3) The following schematic represents a simplified model of a DC motor:

The motor is describe by the following differential equation:

+ +

a) Determine the motors transfer function from the input voltage to the shaft speed:
() =

()
()

() =

()
()

b) Determine the motors transfer function from the input voltage to the shaft position:

c) Add position control to the motor in the form of unity feedback with a controller gain of .
Draw a block diagram for this closed-loop system, and determine the closed-loop transfer
function from the reference input to the motor position:
() =

()
()

For the remainder of the problem, use the following system parameter values:
= 0.01 2

= 0.001
= 0.02

= 10

d) Determine the requirements on the controller gain, , such that position overshoot is limited to
% 15%.

e) What value of gain, , will yield a risetime of 12. What is the overshoot at this value of
gain?
4) This problem examines the concept of dominant system poles, and the relationship between the
real parts of poles and their relative effects on the system response.
Consider the following third-order system, consisting of a pair of underdamped poles and a single
real pole
() =

2
( + )( 2 + 2 + 2 )

It can be shown that the step response for this system is

where

() = 1 + + sin( )
=
=

2
2 2 + 2

(2 2 + 2 )(1 2 )

= tan1

1 2
1 2
+ tan1

a) What is the approximate step response when gets very large? That is, as the frequency of the
real pole gets very large, and that pole moves very far into the LHP.

b) What is the approximate step response when gets small? That is, as moves toward the origin
in the LHP.

c) Now, let = 1 and = 0.7. Additionally, express the value of the real pole as a multiple of the
real part of the underdamped poles: = . Use MATLAB to generate step responses for a
range of values to help answer the following question. How large must be for the
underdamped poles to dominate the system response, and for the effect of the single real pole
to be negligible? What youre determining here is roughly how much higher in frequency a pole
must be (i.e., its real part) for it to have a negligible impact on system response.
The details of your MATLAB plot are left up to you. Choose the values of for which you plot
responses, and the overall plot formatting to best communicate an answer to the questions
above.