DEID-Based Control of Networked Rapid Control Prototyping System: Design and Applications

This article presents a novel networked rapid control prototyping (NRCP) system, which can significantly facilitate the theoretical analysis and product design of networked control systems (NCSs). The NRCP system consists of a PC controller equipped with MATLAB/Simulink software and an embedded target designed with open-source hardware, e.g., Raspberry Pi and STM32. Therefore, it benefits from the following advantages, such as simple structure, low cost, convenient deployment, and robust scalability. In order to verify the effectiveness and superiority of the proposed NRCP, a networked magnetic levitation control system (NMLCS) is developed on the basis of this NRCP system. Furthermore, a discrete-time equivalent-input-disturbance (DEID)-based model predictive control approach is proposed for NMLCS to deal with the common practical issues in NCSs, such as time delay and disturbance. Specifically, the time delay is modeled as delay-induced disturbance (DID), whose influence is effectively estimated and eliminated by the designed controller. Several experimental case studies are performed to verify the effectiveness of the NRCP, the DEID-based control algorithm, and the analytical method of DID.