Masashi Tani

Design and development of single side driven wheelchairs by using internal model control

This study is focused on the design and testing of a newly assisting unit for standard wheelchairs for hemiplegia person. People with this type of disability often drive standard wheelchairs with one active hand and foot in the present situation. Conventional single side driven non-powered wheelchairs have various types of problems, e.g., large rotation radius, difficulty of operations. The purpose of this paper is to solve these problems of current single side driven wheelchairs by using internal model control (IMC) design structure from technology of independence point of view. The control method by combining the IMC design with limiting properties of LQ control is implemented to the single side driven wheelchair. Robust stability for parameter perturbation is also discussed theoretically. The experimental results show that the method is effective on tracking control for the single side driven wheelchair.

Disturbance decoupling control of a mechanical system by reduced order observer based stabilizing controller

We propose a reduced order observer-based stabilizing controller by using limiting properties of LQR. The proposed reduced order observer-based stabilizing controller has disturbance decoupling property which is the same as the full order observer-based stabilizing controller, and has same property, i.e., good tracking performance, of the internal model control (IMO) design structure. In order to verify the proposed method, we apply the reduced order observer-based stabilizing controller to a mechanical system, and confirm effectiveness of the proposed properties by comparative experiments. The experimental results show that the proposed method is effective on disturbance decoupling control for a small cart carrier.

Disturbance estimation by generalized internal model control and its application to assistive devices for rehabilitation technology

Control applications to life science are significant for the development interacting with humans. Assistive devices for rehabilitation technology will be used by elderly or disabled people in order to support more life independence. For the interaction with humans, safety and reliability conditions have to be fulfilled, and control design methods for assistive devices have to be robust against parameter perturbations. To improve these situations, disturbance estimation property of the generalized internal model control (GIMC) design is applied. The effectiveness of the GIMC design is confirmed by experimental case studies for assistive devices

Internal model control for assisting unit of wheeled walking frames

The work presents the wheeled walking frames that are supporting equipments, to be used by elderly people or handicapped in rehabilitation. Mostly, standard frames have weakness in walking on upward/downward slope. People often need power assistance on upward, and need secure walking support without falling on downward. The purpose of this paper is to develop a speed control assisting unit for wheeled walking frames by using the generalized internal model control (GIMC) with LQ control. By selecting appropriate parameter, the control method has various type of control scheme. Effectiveness of the assisting unit is confirmed by comparative experiments on upward and downward slopes. The result shows that the proposed method is effective on speed control for the assisting unit of wheeled walking frames.

Decoupling property of full Information H ∞ control and its application to mechanical systems

In this paper, a limiting property of full information Hinfin control is discussed. Existence of a stabilizing solution to the control problem is shown, and limiting behaviors, i.e., disturbance attenuation property and decoupling property, of the closed-loop system are proposed. Moreover, the relationship with limiting properties of LQ control is also mentioned. To confirm effectiveness of the proposed limiting property of full information H infin control, the paper gives experimental results on decoupling control of a 2-link robot manipulator

Cooperative transportation control by using internal model control design and LQ control

Robust properties of a control method by combining internal model control and LQ control (IMC-LQ control) are proposed in this paper. The method is applied to cooperative transportation control by two vehicles without explicit communication. By using the IMC-LQ control method, the controlled object achieves good tracking performance against disturbance and modeling error. Effectiveness of the proposed method is confirmed by cooperative experiments.

Design of Functional Observer for Linear System with Unknown Disturbance and Its Application to Disturbance Attenuation

This paper presents a reduced-order functional observer for linear system with unknown disturbance from Hinfin performance point of view. The proposed reduced-order functional observer can be designed under a less strict existence condition. The controller scheme based on the proposed functional observer can simultaneously estimate a state-function and unknown disturbance, and can be applied to disturbance attenuation problems. Numerical example is given to illustrate the properties of the proposed reduced-order functional observer

Design and Development of Speed Controller for Wheeled Walking Frames (Application of Internal Model Control and LQ Control with Servo Compensation)

The work presents the wheeled walking frames that are supporting equipments, to be used by elderly people or handicapped in rehabilitation. Mostly, standard frames have weakness in walking on upward/downward slope. People often need power assistance on upward, and need secure walking support without falling on downward. The purpose of this paper is to develop a speed control assisting unit for wheeled walking frames by using the generalized internal model control (GIMC) with LQ control. By selecting appropriate parameter, the control method has various type of control scheme. Effectiveness of the assisting unit is confirmed by comparative experiments on upward and downward slopes. The result shows that the proposed method is effective on speed control for the assisting unit of wheeled walking frames.