Non-linear control technique of a pendulum via cable length manipulation: Application of particle swarm optimization to controller design

• Main Author: Abe Akira
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: University of Belgrade - Faculty of Mechanical Engineering, Belgrade 2013-01-01
• Series: FME Transactions
• Subjects: vibration control; parametric resonance; non-linear feedback control; particle swarm optimization; experimental validation
• Online Access: https://scindeks-clanci.ceon.rs/data/pdf/1451-2092/2013/1451-20921304265A.pdf
• ISSN: 1451-2092; 2406-128X

This paper presents a novel vibration control technique for a pendulum via cable length manipulation. To control the sway angle by using the reeling and unreeling of the hositing cable, we develop a non-linear feedback control scheme by utilising parametric resonance, in which the control input is defined as the acceleration of the cable. Because the governing equation and the control law are non-linear, it is very difficult to analytically solve the feedback gains for the stabilization of the system. Hence, the feedback gains are determined by the use of particle swarm optimization (PSO), which is an evolutionary computation technique, to reduce the sway angle to the maximum extent possible. The validity of the proposed control technique is confirmed by numerical simulations. To verify the feasibility of the present approach, experiments are also performed. From the experimental results, we demonstrate that the application of the PSO algorithm for tuning the feedback gains is valid and that the proposed non-linear feedback control scheme is effective for the vibration control of a pendulum with variable length.