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Model-free Adaptive Control for Magnetic Levitation Ball System

LI Xiao1, HOU Zhong Sheng1, JIN Shang Tai1
1. Advanced Control Systems Laboratory of the School of Electronic and Information Engineering, Beijing Jiaotong University, Beijing,
100044
E-mail: 10120298@ bjtu.edu.cn, zhshhou@bjtu.edu.cn, shtjin@bjtu.edu.cn
Abstract: A data-driven model free adaptive control (MFAC) is presented for the magnetic levitation ball system based on the
full form dynamic linearization method. The main feature of the proposed approach is that the controller design depends merely
on the input and the output measurement data of the controlled plant. The numerical simulations show the effectiveness of the
proposed approach.
Key Words: Model-free adaptive control, Full form dynamic linearization, Magnetic levitation ball system

demonstrate the efficiency of the MFAC. Finally, some

1 Introduction conclusions are drawn in section 5.
Nowadays, magnetic levitation techniques have been 2 Problem Formulation
widely used in various fields, such as high-speed trains
[1]-[5], magnetic bearings [6], [7], and wind tunnel levitation The magnetic levitation ball system consists of an
[8] for eliminating mechanical friction, decreasing electromagnet, a ball position sensor, a power amplifier and
maintainable cost, and achieving high-precision positioning. a steel ball. Assume that the ball is only affected by the
However, it is difficult to build an accurate mathematical gravity and magnetic force. The magnetic force depends on
model for the magnetic levitation system, which makes it the electromagnet characteristics, the coil current, and the air
difficult to design the control algorithm. This motives us to gap between the steel ball and electromagnet. The motion of
study the data-driven control approaches for the magnetic the steel ball in the magnetic field is expressed as
levitation system.
­ d 2 y (t )
The “data-driven control” means that the controller design °m F (u , y )  mg dynamic equation
is merely using measured input and output (I/O) data of a ° dt 2
plant without explicitly using of any information from °
° u 2 (1)
mathematical model of the controlled plant, and whose ® F (u, y ) k ( ) electrical, mechanical related equation
° y
stability, convergence and robustness can be guaranteed by °
rigorous mathematics analysis under certain reasonable °mg  F (u0 , y0 ) 0 boundary condition
assumptions [9]. Recently, a typical data-driven control °̄
approach, model-free adaptive control (MFAC), has been
proposed for a class of discrete-time nonlinear systems where m denotes mass of the steel ball ( g ) , y denotes the
[10]-[14] based on a series of the dynamic linearization air gap between the steel ball and electromagnet (m) ,
methods. The theoretical analysis, extensive simulations,
F (u, y) denotes the magnetic force ( N ) , u denotes the coil
and comparison experiments show that the MFAC approach
can guarantee the bounded input and bounded output (BIBO) current ( A) , g denotes the gravitational
2
stability and tracking error asymptotic convergence [13-14]. P0 K f AN
acceleration (m / s 2 ) , k  is a constant, N
In this paper, the full form dynamic linearization based 4
model free adaptive control (FFDL-MFAC) scheme is
denotes the number of coil turns, K f A denotes the effective
designed for the magnetic levitation ball system merely using
the input and the output measurement data. The numerical cross section area, and P0 4S u107 H / m denotes the air
simulations show the effectiveness of the proposed control permeability.
approach.
Substituting electrical, mechanical related equation into
The rest of this paper is organized as follows. Section 2 is dynamic equation, yields
the problem formulation. In section 3, the full form dynamic
linearization (FFDL) method is presented for the magnetic d 2 y (t ) u (t ) 2
levitation ball system, and the model-free adaptive control m k( )  mg (2)
dt 2 y(t )
scheme is designed based on the FFDL data model. In
section 4, some numerical simulations are given to
The control objective is to design an FFDL-MFAC
scheme without knowing the exact model of the magnetic
levitation ball system.
*
This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of
China (60834001, 61120106009), and the Fundamental Research Funds
for the Central Universities(2011JBM201).

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 In order to apply the FFDL-MFAC scheme, equation (2) is where I (k ) [I1 (k ),, IL (k ), IL 1 (k ), , IL  Lu (k )]T ,
y y y
discretized by first-order Euler’s method
'y(k  1) y(k  1)  y(k ) , 'H (k ) H (k )  H (k  1) ,
,
2 2
T k u (k ) I (k ) d b , and both Ly and Lu are called pseudo orders.
y(k  1) 2 y(k )  y(k  1)  u T 2g (3)
m y 2 (k )
According to Lemma 1, the magnetic levitation system (3)
where T denotes the sample time. can be transformed into the following FFDL data model,

3 FFDL-MFAC Algorithm y(k  1) y(k )  I T (k )'H (k )

(7)
y(k )  I T (k )['y(k ),, 'y(k  Ly  1), 'u(k ),, 'u(k  Lu  1)]
3.1 Full Form Dynamic Linearization
where 'y(k  1) y(k  1)  y(k ), 'u(k ) u(k )  u(k 1),
Consider a class of SISO discrete-time nonlinear systems
as follows, I (k ) is the PG of the magnetic levitation system (3), y (k )
denotes the air gap between the steel ball and electromagnet
y(k  1) f ( y(k ),, y(k  ny ), u(k ),, u(k  nu )), (4) and u (k ) denotes the coil current.

where u(k )  R and y(k )  R are the control input and the 3.2 Control Scheme Design
system output at time instant k , respectively. n y and nu are
In this subsection, the model-free adaptive control scheme
two unknown integers. f () is an unknown nonlinear is designed based on the FFDL data model (7).
function.
Consider the following cost function of control input
L L
Denote H (k )  R y u as a vector consisting of all control
2 2
input signals within a input-related moving time window J (u(k )) yd (k  1)  y(k  1)  O u(k )  u(k  1) , (8)
[k  Lu  1, k ] and all system output signals within a
output-related moving time window [k  Ly  1, k ] , where O ! 0 is a weighting factor, yd (k  1) is the reference
signal.
H (k ) [ y(k ),, y(k  Ly  1), u(k ),, u(k  Lu  1)]T , (5)
Substituting (7) into (8), differentiating (8) w.r.t. u (k ) ,
and solving it, yield the control algorithm as follows,
where two integers Ly and Lu ( 0 d Ly d ny , 1 d Lu d nu )
are called pseudo orders of the system in this paper. U1IL 1 (k )  yd (k  1)  y (k ) 
y
u (k ) u (k  1)  2
Assumption 1 The partial derivatives of f () with respect O  IL 1 (k ) y

to all variables are continuous. Ly

IL 1 (k )¦ UiIi (k ) 'y (k  i  1)
y
Assumption 2 System (4) satisfies generalized Lipschitz  i 1
2
(9)
condition, that is, O  IL 1 (k ) y

Ly  Lu
y(k  1)  y(k ) d b H (k )  H (k  1) , (6)
IL 1 (k )
y ¦
i Ly  2
UiIi (k )'u (k  Ly  i  1)
holds for any H (k )  H (k  1) z 0 . b is a positive  2
,
O  IL 1 (k )
constant. y

The following Lemma presents Full Form Dynamic where 0  Ui d 1, i 1, 2,, Ly  Lu is the step factor, which is
Linearization method of system (4) in detail. added to make the control algorithm more flexible.
[12]
Lemma 1 For nonlinear system (4) satisfying Assumption Since PG I (k ) is unknown, we present the control
1 and Assumption 2 and any fixed 0 d Ly d ny , 1 d Lu d nu ,
algorithm as
L L
then there must exist a time-varying vector I (k )  R y u ,
called Pseudo Gradient (PG), such that the system (4) can be
transformed into following FFDL data model,

'y(k  1) I T (k )'H (k ),

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 U1IˆL 1 (k )  yd (k  1)  y (k ) 
y
U1IˆL 1 (k )  yd (k  1)  y (k ) 
y
u (k ) u (k  1)  2
u (k ) u (k  1)  2
O  Iˆ Ly 1 (k ) O  IˆL 1 (k )
y

Ly Ly

IˆL 1 (k )¦ UiIˆi (k )'y (k  i  1)

y
IˆL 1 (k )¦ UiIˆi (k )'y (k  i  1)
y
i 1 i 1
 2
(10)  2
(15)
O  Iˆ Ly 1 ( k ) O  IˆL 1 (k )y

Ly  Lu Ly  Lu

IˆL 1 (k )
y ¦ UiIˆi (k )'u (k  Ly  i  1) IˆL 1 (k )
y ¦ UiIˆi (k )'u (k  Ly  i  1)
i Ly  2 i Ly  2
 2
.  2
.
O  IˆL 1 (k )y
O  IˆL 1 (k ) y

where Iˆi (k ) is to learn parameter Ii (k ) and updated in where H is a small positive constant, Iˆ(1) is the initial value
terms of the optimal solution of the following criterion index of Iˆ(k ) .
function
2
Remark 1 From (13)-(15), we can see that the FFDL-MFAC
J (I (k )) y (k )  y (k  1)  I T (k )'H (k  1) scheme only utilizes the online measurement I/O data of the
2
(11) closed loop controlled system, and does not explicitly or
 P I (k )  Iˆ(k  1) , implicitly include any information on the system dynamic
model.
where P ! 0 is a weighting factor.
Remark 2 FFDL-MFAC scheme has a L y  Lu 
Using the optimal condition and matrix inversion lemma, dimensional vector Iˆ(k ) to tune on-line, whilst the pseudo
the optimizer of (11) gives
orders Ly and Lu are also adjustable. For an unknown
Iˆ(k ) Iˆ(k  1) system, the pseudo orders Ly and Lu can be set to be the



K'H (k  1) y (k )  y (k  1)  IˆT (k  1)'H (k  1) (12)
,
 approximations of n y and nu , or just chosen as small as
2 possible in order to get a simple controller with low
P  'H (k  1)
computational burden. When Ly 0 and Lu L ,
where 0  K  2 is a step factor. FFDL-MFAC scheme (13)-(15) becomes PFDL-MFAC
scheme [13]; and when Ly 0 and Lu 1 , FFDL-MFAC
By integrating control algorithm (10) and PG estimation scheme (13)-(15) becomes CFDL-MFAC scheme [13].
algorithm (12), FFDL-MFAC scheme is constructed as Comparing with CFDL-MFAC scheme and PFDL-MFAC
follows, scheme, FFDL-MFAC scheme has more adjustable degrees
of freedom and more design flexibility by introducing more
Iˆ(k ) Iˆ(k  1) step factors as U1 , U2 , U Ly  Lu .



K'H (k  1) y (k )  y (k  1)  IˆT (k  1)'H (k  1) , 4 Simulations
2
P  'H (k  1) (13)
In this section, the comparison simulations are provided to
Iˆ(k ) Iˆ(1) if Iˆ(k ) d H or 'H (k ) d H or
illustrate the effectiveness of the FFDL-MFAC scheme. The
 
sign IˆLy 1 (k ) z sign IˆLy 1 (1) .   parameters of the magnetic levitation system in this paper are
given in Table 1.

Table 1: Parameters of the Magnetic Levitation System

Parameters Value Parameters Value

m 22 g x0 20.00 mm

i0 0.6105 A r 12.5 mm
2.3142e-004
k N 2450
Nm2/A2
R 13.8 : g 9.8 m/s2

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 For comparison with MFAC controller, PID controller is
taken as the control group. Matlab S-function builder is used
to build the MFAC controller and PID controller with the
discrete sample mode and sample time being 0.003s.

The simulation diagram of Matlab/Simulink is shown as

below:

Fig. 1: Simulation Diagram using PID and MFAC Fig. 2: The output response of step signal using PID controller and
MFAC controller
The control algorithm of PID is:
Table 2: RMS of the PID Controller and MFAC Controller
­ T k
T ½
u (k ) k p ®e(k )  ¦ e(i )  d [e(k )  e(k  1)]¾ (16)
Ti T Control algorithm RMS
¯ i 0 ¿

PID 6.555h
where e(k ) yd (k )  y(k ) , yd (k ) denotes the reference

signal, k p denotes the proportional coefficient, Ti denotes MFAC 3.303h

the integration time constant, Td denotes the derivative time Case 2: with output disturbance
constant, and T denotes the time step.
In this case, the disturbance signal
In order to compare the efficiency of MFAC and PID ­0, k d 0.6 s
control, we take the root mean square (RMS) as an index °
d (k ) ®0.005, 0.6s  k d 0.609 is added to magnetic
which is given by: °0, k ! 0.609
¯
N levitation system. The simulation results are shown in Fig. 3
eRMS ¦ e( k )
k 1
2
N (17) and Table 3. We can see that the FFDL-MFAC scheme
guarantees the BIBO stability.

The desired air gap is set to be yd (k ) 0.01m . The initial

air gap and the coil current are: y(0) 0, and u(0) 0.

After several trial and error runs, the best PID parameters
are set to be

kp 1.8, ki 0.03, kd 20.

The pseudo orders, step factors, the weighting factors, and

the initial value of the PG estimation in the FFDL-MFAC
scheme are set to Ly 2, Lu 2, K 1 , P 1 , U 1 ,
O 0.00001 , I (0) [2  1 0.01 0.01] .

Three cases are considered: (1) without output disturbance

and measurement noise, (2) with output disturbance, (3) with
output disturbance and measurement noise. Fig. 3: The output response of interfering signal using PID
controller and MFAC controller
Case 1: without output disturbance and measurement noise
Table 3: RMS of the PID Controller and MFAC Controller
The simulation results in Fig. 2 and Table. 2 show that the
Control algorithm RMS
FFDL-MFAC scheme has faster system response, almost the
same overshoot, and shorter settling time compared with PID PID 7.248h


method.

MFAC 3.917h

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Case 3: With output disturbance and measurement noise
In this case, a uniformly distributed measurement noise on
interval (Ѹ 0.0005, 0.0005) is also added to the output y (k ) .
The simulation results are shown in Fig. 4 and Table 4. We
can see that MFAC controller has a more strong robustness
with a smaller RMS.
Fig. 4: The output response of white noise signal using PID
controller and MFAC controller
Table 4: RMS of the PID Controller and MFAC Controller
Control algorithm RMS

PID 7.880h

MFAC 5.580h
5 Conclusion
In this study, a FFDL-MFAC control approach is
presented for magnetic levitation ball system. The main
feature of the approach is that the controller design depends
merely on the measured I/O data of a plant without explicitly
using of any information from mathematical model of the
controlled plant. Several simulation comparisons between
PID and MFAC are made to demonstrate the control
effectiveness of the proposed approach.
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