Extended Bandwidth Zero Phase Error Tracking Control of Nonminimal Phase Systems

This paper describes a new feedforward algorithm for accurate tracking control of nonminimal phase systems. Accurate feedforward calculation involves a prefilter design using the inverse system model. Nonminimal phase systems cause problems with this prefilter design, because unstable zeros become unstable poles in the inverse model. The zero phase error tracking control algorithm (ZPETC) consists of a substitution scheme, which removes the unstable zeros. This scheme introduces a small gain error, which increases with frequency, but no phase error. This paper investigates additional properties which give more insight into the ZPETC algorithm, and allow to improve it. The improved algorithm is based on the same substitution scheme as ZPETC, but adds additional feedforward terms to compensate for the gain error. These additional terms increase the frequency range for which the overall transfer function has only limited gain error, without introducing phase errors. The additional feedforward terms repeatedly reduce the tracking error proportional to ε2, ε4, ε6, …, where ε is the ZPETC tracking error. The new feedforward algorithm or new substitution scheme is therefore called “extended bandwidth zero phase error tracking control algorithm” (EBZPETC). Experimental results on a one-link flexible robot compares both methods.