BMFA 3313

Control Systems

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At the end of this chapter, you should be able
to:

i. Define and describe a root locus.

ii. Sketch and refine a root locus of a control
system transfer function.
iii. Relate system transient response and
stability to root locus characteristics.

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Root Locus is renowned as a great graphical tool in
characterizing the dynamics behavior of a system,
e.g. rise time, peak time, settling time, and percent
overshoot to changes in system parameters and
variation in system’s loop gain.

Root locus also defined stability region or ranges

that can be a limit to system stability.

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The position of closed loop poles will determine the
transient response and stability characteristics of a
system.

(a) Closed loop system, (b) Equivalent system

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 The characteristic equation of the equivalent
system is the denominator of the transfer
function.
The closed loop poles is a function of the gain
K (by factoring this denominator).

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A root locus illustrates how the closed-loop
poles behave as the gain K is varied. Consider
the following system;

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The characteristic equation, s2+5s+K can be
factored to determine the closed-loop poles
for different gain K. Table 1 summarizes the
closed-loop poles for various value of K.

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The transition
of the closed-
loop poles
(pole 1 and
pole 2) for
different
values of the
gain K.

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The following conclusions can be made:
 The closed-loop poles move away from the
open loop poles at 0 and -5 (to the left and
right respectively) as the gain K is varied.
 At gain of 6.25, the closed-loop poles are
overlapped at -2.51 before expanding
vertically into the imaginary axis as the gain
is further increased.

The lines that make-up all the points are referred

as the root locus of the transfer function G(s).

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The first condition states that the
magnitude of the product between
the gain K, system G(s) and the
transducer H(s) is unity.

The second condition states that

sum of all the angles of the open
loop poles and zeros equal the odd-
multiple of 1800 (that is 1800, 5400,
and 9000 for k = 0,1 and 2
respectively).

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 Root Locus
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Imaginary Axis
0
System: sys
Gain: 0
Pole: -1 - 3.87i
Damping: 0.25
Overshoot (%): 44.4
Frequency (rad/sec): 4

-5
-4 -3 -2 -1 0 1 2 3
Real Axis
Root Locus
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4 System: sys
Gain: 0
3 Pole: -1 + 1i
Damping: 0.707
2 Overshoot (%): 4.32
Frequency (rad/sec): 1.41
Imaginary Axis

-1

-2

-3

-4

-5
-6 -5 -4 -3 -2 -1 0 1 2
Real Axis
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Real-axis Breakaway and Break-in Points

At the point of
breaking-away,
the gain at the real
axis is at the
maximum.

At the point of
breaking-in, the
gain at the real axis
is at the minimum.

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We use the Routh-Hurwitz method in order to
determine the gain and the point at the
crossing. Why the Routh-Hurwitz method?

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In order to sketch a root locus more accurately, we
need to know the angle of departure (from the
pole) and the angle of arrival (the zero).

Consider the following open loop poles and zeros. A

point is chosen very close to the point of interest (a
point where the angle of departure or arrival is
desired).

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