A Real-Time Computer Control Demonstrator for Use in a University Control Laboratory

An angular position servosystem made of a dc servomotor controlled by a TM990 microcomputer is described. The objective is to offer a control laboratory demonstrator for the study of a number of questions concerning computer control theory and practice. The control strategy uses state feedback and can be chosen to be either of the Kalman regulator type or of the bang-bang relay type; the parameters of these strategies such as gain, threshold, quantization levels, and sampling frequency can be selected via appropriate teletype commands. The evaluation of the state can be made in three different ways: a direct position and speed measurement, a direct measurement of the position followed by the computation of the derivative to obtain the speed, and the use of a Kalman-Bucy observer. The computer program is written in Basic.