Control Engineering - 2020 entry

The advancement of technology during the 20th century put control engineering on the map - and it plays a critical role in everything from simple household washing machines to high performance fighter aircraft. This module will give you a fundamental understanding of control engineering. It starts by providing the necessary mathematical foundation; including Laplace transform techniques and theorems, for modelling and analysing the dynamics of engineering systems. You will learn about the modelling of engineering systems, including mechanical, electrical and electro-mechanical systems, using differential equations and transfer function analysis. Furthermore, you will analyse the fundamental concept of feedback and its impact on system dynamics. You will study the performance of closed loop systems from a time domain and frequency domain perspective. Classical approaches to studying closed loop systems will be introduced including root-locus, Nyquist and Bode diagram methods. The module introduces you to the fundamentals of proportional-integral-derivative (PID) control, which you will use to analyse and design control engineering systems. The lectures are supported by computer laboratories for modelling and simulation of systems using the Control Engineering toolbox in Matlab.

This module introduces you to the basic concepts of dynamics and supporting computational techniques. It also teaches you the concepts of feedback and stability. Finally, it exposes you to standard control concepts and calculations by a detailed analysis of proportional, integral and derivative controllers for single input single output control loops.

1: Properties and theorems of Laplace transform;

2: Simple linear approximations of nonlinear systems;

3: Transfer functions of linear systems;

4: Block diagrams;

5: Sinusoidal response of the system;

6: Nyquist plot;

7: Bode diagrams;

8: Open and closed-loop control systems;

9: Sensitivity of control systems to parameter variation;

10: Disturbance rejection;

11: Transient response;

12: Steady-state error;

13: The stability of linear feedback systems;

14: Routh Hurwitz criterion;

15: Nyquist Stability criterion;

16: Root locus;

17: Three-term PID controller;

18: Proportional (P) control of generic systems;

19: PI control of systems;

20: PID control and Ziegler-Nichols tuning: 21: Gain and phase margins;

22: Coprime factorization of transfer functions;

23: Youla parameterization of all stabilizing controllers.

As the module is assessed by the examination and coursework, the ref/def assessment will be by examination. The candidates will be awarded the ref/def examination mark combined with the original coursework mark.

Reading list for this module: