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Comparison of negative and positive position feedback control of a flexible structure

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2011 Smart Mater. Struct. 20 015011

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IOP PUBLISHING SMART MATERIALS AND STRUCTURES
Smart Mater. Struct. 20 (2011) 015011 (10pp) doi:10.1088/0964-1726/20/1/015011

Comparison of negative and positive

position feedback control of a flexible
structure
Sang-Myeong Kim1 , Semyung Wang1,3 and Michael J Brennan2
1
Mechatronics, Gwangju Institute of Science and Technology, 261 Cheomdan-gwagiro,
Buk-gu, Gwangju, 500-712, Korea
2
Institute of Sound and Vibration Research, University of Southampton, University Road,
Highfield, Southampton SO17 1BJ, UK

E-mail: smkim123@hanmail.net, smwang@gist.ac.kr and mjb@isvr.soton.ac.uk

Received 24 August 2010, in final form 8 November 2010

Published 9 December 2010
Online at stacks.iop.org/SMS/20/015011

Abstract
Two modal control techniques, negative position feedback (NPF) and positive position feedback
(PPF), are applied to reduce multi-mode vibration of a lightly damped flexible beam using a
piezoelectric sensor and piezoelectric actuators. The NPF and PPF controllers are constructed
by respectively feeding back the generalized displacement response from the sensor in a
negative and a positive sense to the actuators through second order high pass and low pass
filters. PPF is well known while NPF is new for this application and is in fact an electrical
realization of a dynamic vibration absorber. The choice of the parameters for controllers of both
types is made easy by a robust modal control technique that offers an optimal performance for
NPF control and a near-optimal performance for PPF control. Explicit forms of the controller
parameters are presented. Experiments are conducted on a cantilever beam embedded with a
matched pair of PZT (lead zirconate titanate) patch actuators and a collocated PVDF
(polyvinylidene fluoride) patch sensor. The experiments demonstrate that it is possible to
realize an electrical dynamic absorber using the generalized displacement sensor. It is further
demonstrated that NPF can be a good alternative control strategy particularly when multiple
modes are to be controlled.
(Some figures in this article are in colour only in the electronic version)

1. Introduction
Positive position feedback (PPF) has been widely used to
reduce the vibration of a flexible structure which has a
large number of modes [1]. PPF was originally developed
to overcome the practical shortcomings when implementing
direct velocity feedback (DVFB) to this application [2], such
as transducer installation problems and finite bandwidths of
transducers [3]. For the former, PPF control systems often use
piezoelectric transducers that can be easily embedded within
the structure. For the latter, PPF control uses a low pass
filter such that it is insensitive to the high frequency transducer
dynamics and also to the modes of higher order than the target
3 Author to whom any correspondence should be addressed.
mode. There are also some difficulties in PPF control. For
example, it has an inherent static stability problem at 0 Hz [1].
The controller is also sensitive to the dynamics of the modes
of lower order than the target mode, and little information is
available regarding simple and explicit rules for the design of
the controller parameters. These issues are addressed in this
paper.
A technique called negative position feedback (NPF),
which has been presented under a different name [4] and was
briefly discussed in [5], is employed here to overcome the
difficulties mentioned above. An optimal robust control theory
based on the Nyquist stability criterion [4] is used. There
are only subtle differences between NPF and PPF control
in terms of construction. The NPF (or PPF) controller is
constructed by feeding back the negative (positive) generalized

0964-1726/11/015011+10$33.00 1 © 2011 IOP Publishing Ltd Printed in the UK & the USA
Smart Mater. Struct. 20 (2011) 015011
Figure 1. A smart cantilever beam embedded with a matched pair of
PZT patch actuators (one on top and the other on bottom of the
beam) and a collocated PVDF patch sensor, subject to a primary
excitation f p .
displacement response from the sensor to the actuator through
a second order high pass (low pass) filter. It is shown here
that the NPF controller is an electrical realization of a dynamic
vibration absorber [6] if a generalized displacement sensor is
used. Explicit forms of the controller parameters of NPF and
PPF control are presented which offer an optimal performance
for NPF control and a near-optimal performance for PPF
control. By comparing the two modal control techniques, the
aim of this paper is to illustrate and contrast the performance
and robustness characteristics of NPF and PPF control for a
distributed parameter system.
2. Theory
2.1. Two modal controllers
Consider vibration control of a cantilever beam embedded with
a matched pair of PZT patch actuators (one on each side of the
beam) [7] and a collocated PVDF patch sensor as shown in
figure 1. The beam is subject to an arbitrary primary excitation
f p , the control output is f c , and −H (jω) indicates that is a
negative feedback controller. An accelerometer is attached to
monitor the end tip vibration before and after control. The term
‘collocation’ is used with the assumption that the beam acts as
a one-dimensional structure. It is assumed that the actuators
generate a pure bending moment and the plant response (i.e.,
the sensor output to the actuator input) within the frequency
range of interest is written as

M system such that the phase angle  is −90◦   jωG(jω) 
G(jω) = ks−,m1 ωs2,m s−,m1 , (1)
m=1
√ plant and the electrical dynamic vibration absorber for an
where s,m = [ωs2,m − ω2 + jam ωs,m ω] in which j = −1,
the subscript m denotes the structural mode number from 1
to M inwhich M is the total number of modeled modes,
ωs,m = ks,m /m s,m is the m th structural natural frequency in
which ks,m is the modal stiffness and m s,m is the modal mass,
and am = 2ζs,m is the normalized half-power bandwidth of the
m th mode, in which ζs,m is the modal damping ratio. A residual
stiffness term ks−,res
1
can be further added to equation (1), if
required, to incorporate the effect of the un-modeled higher
frequency modes.
2
S-M Kim et al
The two modal controllers considered in this paper are

M
HNPF (jω) = ka,n (jω)2 a−,n1 , (2)
n=1

M
HPPF(jω) = − ka,n ωa2,n a−,n1 , (3)
n=1
where a,n = [ωa2,n − ω2 + jbn ωa,n ω], n follows the structural
mode number from 1 to M, and the subscript a indicates an
absorber since both ‘resonant’ controllers behave like dynamic
vibration absorbers in a mechanical sense. Thus each filter
has the three parameters ωa,n , bn, and ka,n , and is used to
control the n th structural mode. Equation (2) describes the
NPF controller which has a second order high pass filter while
equation (3) describes the PPF controller which has a second
order low pass filter. The minus sign in equation (3) within
the negative feedback control configuration, −H (jω), means
that it is positive feedback. It should be noted that the two
filters are similar in the ‘resonant’ regions (substitute ωa,n into
equation (2)) and so will be the resulting performances. The
tuned
 natural frequency of the n th absorber filter is ωa,n =
ka,n /m a,n in which ka,n is the equivalent spring coefficient
and m a,n is the equivalent mass of the filter, bn = 2ζa,n is the
normalized half-power bandwidth with ζa,n being the damping
ratio, and ka,n can also be interpreted as the filter gain from
a control point of view. The structural and absorber modal
damping ratios are defined as

ςs,m = cs,m /(2 m s,m ks,m ), (4a )

ςa,n = m a,n ka,n /(2ca,n ). (4b )
Equation (4a ) also relates to an R –C – L series electrical circuit
in which R is a resistor, C is a capacitor, and L is an inductor
(equivalently, an m  c  k parallel oscillator in which m is
mass, c is a damper, and k is a spring), while equation (4b )
relates to an R  C  L parallel circuit [8] (equivalently, m –c–
k series oscillator. see appendix A). The static stiffness of the
plant is given by ks = (ks−,11 + ks−,21 + · · · + ks−,res
1 −1
) , whereas
that of the filter is ka = (ka,1 + ka,2 + · · ·).
Multiplying the receptance-like expression (the ratio of
the generalized position or displacement to excitation) in
equation (1) by jω gives the generalized structural mobility,
and dividing equation (2) by jω gives the generalized absorber
impedance (force divided by velocity). It is clear from
the generalized mobility that the plant is a minimum phase
90◦ [9]. It should be noted that the structural mobility and
the absorber impedance exactly match those for the nominal
active vibration isolation system [4] that uses either a velocity
or an acceleration sensor. Thus, the NPF controller is in
fact an electrical realization of the dynamic vibration absorber
that uses a generalized displacement sensor. Details of such
equivalences are summarized in appendix A for a single
degree of freedom (DOF) oscillator plant. A mechanical
analogous model is also presented. Thus NPF is a passivity-
based controller and is unconditionally stable [4], provided
equations (1)–(3) are valid for all frequencies. Such an analogy
is not possible for PPF.
Smart Mater. Struct. 20 (2011) 015011
2.2. Cost function and the constraint
The vibration reduction ratio S(jω) = e/d (or the sensitivity
function), where e and d are the plant responses after
and before control, respectively, is adopted as the control
performance. It can be written in decibels as
RR (dB) = 20 log10 |S(jω)|, (5)
where S(jω) = [1 + L(jω)]−1 in which L(jω) = G(jω)H (jω)
is the open-loop frequency response function (FRF) of the
control system. In this paper, the control system is defined to
be stable and robust with a degree of r if and only if its open-
loop FRF locus does not enclose or cross the circle of radius
r centered at the instability point (−1, 0) [4]. This robustness
condition can be written down as
RR (dB)  (−20 log10 r ), (at all frequencies) (6)
where the limiting value on the right is the maximum allowable
control spillover. Robust optimal control is to achieve the
best performance (i.e., minimize RR) without violating the
constraint in equation (6).
2.3. Coupling analysis
Consider the case when a single (absorber) filter is used in
the control of one of a large number of structural modes
of a flexible structure. The structural mode is termed the
target mode (TM), the other uncontrolled modes are called
the mode(s) of concern (MOC), and the most critical MOC
is the mode of critical concern (MOCC) from the point of
view of stability and robustness. The coupling between the
filter and the TM is called auto-coupling while the coupling
between the filter and an MOC is called cross-coupling. The
coupling/loading among either structural modes or control
filters is called mutual coupling/loading. It is assumed that
the plant is lightly damped and the modes are well separated
such that the response in each resonance region is governed by
a single mode (i.e., the mutual loadings are negligible).
The open-loop gain indicates the control effort as well
as the strength of coupling between the structure and the
absorber [4, 10]. The open-loop FRF for the coupling between
the m th structural mode and the n th absorber filter can be
written as
L NPF (j) = −κmn αnm
2
2 (1 − 2 + jam )−1
1 in which x nm =
× (1 − αnm
2
2 + jbn αnm )−1 , (7)
L PPF (j) = −κmn (1 − 2 + jam )−1
× (1 − αnm
2
2 + jbn αnm )−1 , (8)
where  = ω/ωs,m is a dimensionless frequency normalized
−2
by ωs,m , κmn = ka,n /ks,m = σmn αnm is the effective spring
ratio, σmn = m a,n /m s,m = gmn am bn αnm is the effective
mass ratio, and gmn = ca,n /cs,m is the ratio of damping
coefficients. The non-dimensional variable αnm = ωs,m /ωa,n
can be interpreted as either the inverse of the frequency tuning
ratio when the mode is the TM (i.e., auto-coupling) or the
natural frequency ratio when the mode is a MOC (i.e., cross-
−1
coupling). For the former, the notation β = αnm is used.
3
S-M Kim et al
When the structural mode under consideration is the TM
and the control filter is perfectly tuned such that β = 1, this is
an auto-coupling and equations (7) and (8) reduce to
L NPF (0) → −κnn 2 , (9a )
L NPF ( j ) = gnn , (9b )
L NPF (∞) → −κnn  , −2
(9c)
L PPF (0) → −κnn , (10a )
L PPF ( j ) = gnn , (10b )
−4
L PPF (∞) → −κnn  , (10c)
where the subscript nn is now used instead, and the values
for L(0) and L(∞) are asymptotes when  → 0 and when
 → ∞, respectively. In general, for control performance it
is desirable that the loop gain should be large and real- and
positive-valued in the effective region, while it is desirable
for robustness that the loop gain should be small in the
ineffective regions [4]. In this context, both controllers work
effectively at the resonance frequency when  = 1; in fact they
behave like a skyhook damper of damping coefficient ca,n =
gnn cs,n , yielding an active modal damping ratio of ςs,n(active) =
gnn ςs,n [4]. The asymptotes indicate that NPF control is
insensitive at both low and high frequencies compared to the
TM (by an order of −2 ). PPF control is further insensitive
at frequencies greater than the TM (by an order of −4 ),
however, it is sensitive at frequencies lower than the TM.
NPF is unconditionally stable, while the PPF is not and the
Nyquist stability condition dictates that the gain should be
within 0 < κnn < 1 in equation (10a ) [1]. Thus the amount of
reduction given in equation (10b ) has to be limited even when
an ideal single DOF oscillator plant is considered. When the
structural mode under consideration is again the TM but now
the filter frequency tuning ratio is β = 1, equation (10) at
 = 1 reduces to
L NPF (j) ≈ gnn , (11a )
L PPF (j) ≈ gnn β 2 , (11b )
−1
provided that |x nm |/bn 1 in which x nm = β − β indicates
a normalized mistuning bandwidth. Although there is a subtle
change in the PPF performance according to the tuning ratio,
both work well in the resonant region as both are real- and
positive-valued.
When the structural mode is now an MOC with αnm = 1,
at  = 1 with the condition |x nm |/bn
−1
αnm − αnm equation (10) reduces to
−1 −1
L NPF (j) = jgnn bn δnm x nm , (12a )
−1 −1 −2
L PPF (j) = jgnn bn δnm x nm αnm , (12b )
where −1
gnn δnm = gmn in which δnm = cs,m /cs,n . It can be
seen that, regardless of whether it is a higher or a lower MOC,
the loop gain of NPF control diminishes as the MOC is farther
away from the TM. The loop gain of PPF control additionally
depends on αnm−2
, indicating that it diminishes more rapidly for
a higher order MOC but unfortunately increases for a lower
order mode when αnm 1. This undesirable sensitivity in the
low frequency region is a reason of introducing NPF control in
this paper.
Smart Mater. Struct. 20 (2011) 015011
2.4. Design rules
In this section, the three parameters of both NPF and PPF
control filters (ωa,n , bn , and ka,n ) are determined analytically.
The design method is developed for NPF control and is then
simply extended to PPF, as the PPF controller in equation (3)
behaves similarly to the NPF controller in equation (2) in the
resonant region. The method offers an optimal performance
for NPF control while it offers a near-optimal performance for
PPF control.
When a single NPF filter is used to control single mode
(TM) without considering any other modes (MOC), applying
Den Hartog’s fixed-point theory for vibration absorbers [6]
with the aim of achieving the maximally flat mobility
frequency response function (FRF) gives the optimal tuning
frequency and the optimal bandwidth given by
ωa,n = ωs,n , (13)
 FRFs (a), reduction ratios (b), displacement (c) and velocity
bn = 2κnn , (14)
where κnn = ka,n /ks,n in which ka,n and ks,n are assumed to
be given, and the details of derivation is given in appendix B.
These rules also induce a maximum control spillover of
about 2 dB within the auto-coupled TM response itself (see
appendix B).
If all MOC are now considered and, for convenience, the
same spillover constraint is applied also to all cross-coupled
cases, the complete system is subject to a maximum control
spillover of 2 dB at all frequencies. This action imposes a
certain restriction on the maximum loop gain of the MOC
given in equations (12a ) and (12b ), from which the last
unknown parameter, the filter gain ka,n , is then determined.
This statement can be written down mathematically as
|L(j)|  lMOC , (15)
where lMOC is the maximum allowable loop gain of the MOC
and can be written as lMOC = (ro−1 − ro ) in which ro = 10−2/20
because of the 2 dB spillover constraint and the equation can
be obtained from the right triangle having corners at (−1, 0),
(0, 0), and (0, ±jlMOC /2) in the Nyquist plot. Since κnn =
gnn an bn , combining equations (12a ), (14), and (15) gives the
optimal NPF gain as
ka,n = ks,n an lMOC δnm |x nm |, (16)
where δnm = cs,m /cs,n is related to the relative magnitude
between the TM and MOC resonance peaks, and |x nm | =
−1
|αnm − αnm | with αnm = ωs,m /ωs,n is related to the relative
distance between the TM and MOC natural frequencies. The
smallest value of equation (16) is chosen from all the candidate
(M − 1) MOC, and the mode giving the value is the MOCC.
Similarly, the optimal PPF gain is written as
ka,n = ks,n an lMOC δnm |x nm |αnm
2
. (17a )
Note that the choice of 2 dB spillover constraint for cross-
coupling is arbitrary and has been used merely as a reference
to derive equations (16) and (17a ), which then hold for any
control spillover. In PPF control, there is a critical stability
4
S-M Kim et al
issue, which is the static stability at 0 Hz. Applying the same
robust constraint of 2 dB control spillover to this case gives
ka,n = ks (1 − ro ), (17b )
where ks = (ks−,11 + ks−,21 + · · · + ks−,res
1 −1
) is the static stiffness of
the plant. The smaller of equations (17a ) and (17b ) is chosen
as the robust gain in this paper. This gain is then substituted
into equation (14) to obtain the optimal filter bandwidth.
2.5. Examples
2.5.1. Single DOF structure. The NPF and PPF controllers
described in section 2.1 were applied to a single DOF oscillator
with a damping ratio of ςs = 0.01. As there is no limit
of the NPF gain that can be imposed in this case, the PPF
gain from equation (17b ) was used for both controllers for
the purpose of comparison. Figures 2(a)–(d) show open-loop
(d) responses before (dotted lines) and after NPF (solid) or PPF
(dashed) control. The 2 dB robustness boundary circle and line
(dash-dot) are also indicated in (a) and (b), respectively. As
intended, the NPF control offers the maximally flat mobility
FRF in figure 2(d) without violating the maximum control
spillover constraint of 2 dB as can be seen in figures 2(a)
and (b). Whereas, the PPF controller designed to meet the
static robustness (note the loop (dashed) starting point at
(−1 + ro , 0) in figure 2(a)) gives slightly larger and smaller
control spillovers just below and above the resonance region
in figure 2(b), respectively. Nevertheless, the PPF controller
performs as well as the NPF controller in the resonance region
in figures 2(c) and (d). Further, it exhibits a near-optimal
performance yielding a quite flat displacement FRF as can be
seen in figure 2(c).
2.5.2. Two DOF structure. In flexible structures, it is very
likely that, when the TM is the fundamental mode, the MOCC
for NPF control is the second mode while the robustness
concern using PPF control occurs due to static instability at
0 Hz. It is thus interesting to examine the condition when the
two controllers has the same gain. Equating equations (16)
and (17b ) gives
δ12 |x 12| = a1−1 (ks /ks,1 )(1 − ro )/lmoc . (18)
When a1 = 0.02, ks ≈ ks,1 , and the 2 dB cross-coupling
spillover constraint, for example, it yields δ12 |x 12| ≈ 22. If
δ12 |x 12| > 22, NPF control performs better.
If now the second mode is the TM and the fundamental
mode is the MOCC, comparing equations (16) and (17a ) shows
that the NPF controller can have a larger gain by a factor of
−2
α21 . This case is simulated with an arbitrary two DOF system
with parameter values ςs2 = 0.01, δ21 = 1, and α21 = 0.1,
and the results are shown in figure 3 in a similar format to
that of figure 2. The circle-shaped locus (solid or dashed
line) in figure 3(a) is for the MOCC whose maximum gain is
limited by equation (15). Figure 3(b) shows that the design
rules yield a maximum control spillover of about 2 dB for both
NPF and PPF control at all frequencies. It is not clearly seen
Smart Mater. Struct. 20 (2011) 015011
Figure 2. Open-loop FRFs (a), reduction ratios (b), displacement (c) and velocity (d) responses of a single DOF structure of ςs = 0.01 before
(dotted) and after NPF (solid lines) or PPF (dashed) control. The 2 dB robustness boundaries (dash-dot) are indicated in (a) and (b).
in figures 3(c) and (d) but the loading of the absorber slightly
pushes the first mode to a lower frequency. If the 2 dB control
spillover constraint for cross-coupling is completely relaxed as
an extreme case, the NPF gain can have any positive value
but note that the PPF gain has to be limited by the static,
robust stability given by equation (17b ). If the fundamental
mode and the second mode are controlled simultaneously with
also relaxing the spillover constraint for cross-coupling, the
total stiffness (gain) of the PPF type absorber is limited by
ka = ks (1 − ro ) from equation (17b ), where ka = (ka,1 + ka,2 ),
indicating that the total gain must be shared. NPF control is
free from such a restriction because it is unconditionally stable.
It is in this sense that NPF control is useful particularly when
multiple modes are to be controlled.
3. Experimental work
3.1. Plant identification
A smart beam similar to that shown in figure 1 was constructed
using a cantilever beam of aluminum (330 mm × 61 mm ×
3 mm) embedded with a matched pair of PZT ceramic patch
actuators (Fuji Ceramics Co., C-83H, 60 mm × 25 mm × 1 mm)
5
S-M Kim et al
and a collocated PVDF patch sensor (Measurement Specialties,
DT2-028K, 60 mm × 12 mm × 0.028 mm) at its root as
shown in figure 4. Constrained layer damping treatment was
applied to the beam to give moderate passive damping by
using double-sided sticky tape and aluminum tape. To monitor
the vibration before and after control, an accelerometer (B&K
4393) was additionally attached to the end tip along the center
line of the beam and an impact force was applied to the
top of the accelerometer using a hammer (Endevco 2302-
10) shown in figure 4. The detailed feedback loop circuit is
shown in figure 5, where the charge amplifier K s (NEXUS)
was used for conditioning the sensor signal (bandpass range:
0.1 Hz and 100 kHz), the controller −H (jω) was implemented
digitally in a target PC with a sampling frequency of Fs =
32 kHz using the Matlab/Simulink xPC Target module [4],
an anti-aliasing low pass filter (Krohn-Hite 3384) was used
with a cutoff frequency of 16 kHz, analogue circuits (the
voltage follower and the phase inverter) were manufactured
to supply the PZT actuators with signals of opposite phase
to generate a pure bending moment in the beam, and finally
two voltage amplifiers K a (PCB 790A01) were used to excite
the PZT actuators. The detailed wire-connections to the PZT
Smart Mater. Struct. 20 (2011) 015011 S-M Kim et al

Figure 3. Open-loop FRFs (a), reduction ratios (b), displacement (c) and velocity (d) responses of a two DOF structure of ςs2 = 0.01,
δ21 = 1, and α21 = 0.1. Refer to figure 2 for the detailed captions.

Figure 4. Cantilever beam (330 mm × 61 mm × 3 mm) embedded

with a matched pair of PZT ceramic patch actuators
(60 mm × 25 mm × 1 mm) and a PVDF patch sensor
Figure 5. Feedback loop circuit and a cross-sectional view of the
(60 mm × 12 mm × 0.028 mm) realizing the schematic plot in
beam embedded with a pair of PZT actuators and a PVDF sensor.
figure 1, where the hammer was used to excite the beam and the
accelerometer was attached on the beam to monitor the end tip
vibration before and after control.
guarantee of stability was tested. All the measurement results
presented are for full volume.
actuators are also indicated in figure 5 together with the poling The plant FRF G(jω) was measured from the path
directions. A manually controllable potentiometer (volume between the volume controller and the sensor preamplifier
controller) was also used when a new controller with no in figure 5. Rather than the plant itself, the generalized

6
Smart Mater. Struct. 20 (2011) 015011
Figure 6. Measured (solid line) and modeled (dashed) generalized
mobility forms jωG(jω) of the plant G(jω): (a) amplitude and
(b) Nyquist plot. The first six modal responses (dotted) are also
overlaid.
mobility (solid lines) jωG(jω) is shown in figures 6(a) and (b)
together with its identified model (dashed) using six modes
(dotted) which are also individually overlaid in figure 6(a).
The agreement is good in both the amplitude and Nyquist
plots, and the Nyquist plot of the plant exhibits the minimum
phase characteristic (Re[jωG(jω)] > 0) up to the frequency
range considered. Although not shown here, the mobility of
the plant above 2 kHz had two additional dominant peaks at
around 2600 Hz (seventh mode) and 3400 Hz (eighth mode)
and then had showed a noisy amplitude response loosing the
minimum phase characteristic. The relative modal amplitudes
are highly dependent on the length of the PZT actuators used.
It is seen that, for the particular size of the PZT actuators
used (2/11 of the beam length), the responses of the fifth to
eighth modes turn out to be quite large. PPF control is known
to be suitable for such a plant that does not roll-off at high
frequencies. However, the NPF was also tested here since
the bandpass filtering characteristic of this controller (roll-off
rate: 1/ω) could circumvent such stability issues at very high
frequencies. This is examined in section 3.2 with real-time
control tests.
7
S-M Kim et al
3.2. Controller design and tests
From the identified model in figure 6, it is straightforward
to design the NPF and PPF controllers from equations (13),
(14), (16) and (17). Once the filter parameters (ωa,n , bn , and
ka,n ) were calculated, the discrete forms of the controllers were
implemented in the xPC target using the filter forms given
in appendix A [4]. The fundamental mode was first treated.
Figures 7(a) and (b) show (a) the Nyquist plot of the open-
loop FRFs of the NPF (solid line) and PPF (dashed) controllers
together with the boundary circle of the 2 dB control spillover
(dash-dot) and (b) the end tip acceleration responses before
(dotted) and after control (solid and dashed), respectively. The
corresponding reduction ratios and the PVDF sensor responses
before and after control were also calculated and measured in a
similar way to figure 2, but are not shown here for brevity. The
MOCC of the NPF control was the second mode while that
of the PPF control occurred due to the static robustness. The
circular locus (solid line) of lMOC ≈ 0.46 in figure 7(a) was
due to the MOCC with the resonance of 134 Hz. The results
are similar to those shown for an ideal single DOF system in
figure 2; subtle differences in the fundamental modal responses
were due to mutual coupling with the higher order structural
modes. The PPF control appears to perform better, but this is at
the expense of increased control spillover at lower frequencies
below the first resonant region. If the higher modes are more
remotely located from the fundamental mode with a smaller
amplitude, the NPF controller will perform better. Thus, the
performances of NPF and PPF control are strongly dependent
on the plant under control. The second mode was then treated
and the results are shown in figures 7(c) and (d) in the same
form of figures 7(a) and (b). The MOCC for the NPF controller
was the seventh mode above 2 kHz, while that for the PPF
controller was the first mode. Thus the NPF controller was
designed based on the seventh mode (its maximum loop gain
lMOC was slightly larger than that for the sixth mode shown),
although not shown in the figure due to a limited frequency
resolution because of the bandwidth used for impact tests. The
results are similar to those simulation results shown for the two
DOF system in figure 3. It is clear that the NPF controller
performs better, but there was control spillover more than 2 dB
for the fifth and sixth modes. This result, which was not
predicted by the theory in section 2, was mainly due to the
time delays in the xPC target controller and the anti-aliasing
low pass filter [4, 9] which could be greatly reduced if an
analogue control filter were used. The fundamental and second
modes were then controlled simultaneously and the results are
shown in figures 7(e) and (f). The control performance shown
in figure 7(f) is similar to that achieved by superimposing
figures 7(b) and (d). The control spillover of the sixth mode
reaches up to 6 dB because of the time delay of the control
system as well as the multiple cross-coupling with the two
absorber filters. Comparing figures 7(a)–(f), together with
those simulations in figures 2 and 3, demonstrates that NPF
control performs as well as PPF control and it is particularly
useful when multiple modes are controlled. Finally the NPF
and PPF control performances simulated and tested for all three
cases are summarized in table 1, where reduction ratios RR(min)
Smart Mater. Struct. 20 (2011) 015011 S-M Kim et al

Figure 7. NPF (solid lines) and PPF control (dashed) of the fundamental mode ((a) and (b)), the second mode ((c) and (d)), and both the
fundamental and second modes ((e) and (f)): ((a), (c), (e)) Nyquist plot together with the control spillover boundaries of 2 dB (dash-dot), and
((b), (d), (f)) the accelerometer responses before (dotted) and after (solid and dashed) control.

were obtained from the acceleration responses before and after
control.
The experimental beam considered in this paper was
lightly damped, with the damping ratios of the first two modes
being around 1%. It is interesting to investigate how such
active modal control strategies would perform if the damping
were increased by a factor of 10, say. Consider the case, for
simplicity, when a single filter is used to control a single mode.
From equations (5) and (9b ), the reduction ratio can be written
as
RR (dB) = −20 log10 |1 + (ca /cs )|,
where cs is the damping of the structural mode and ca is that of
the absorber which can also be regarded as the filter gain. To

8
Smart Mater. Struct. 20 (2011) 015011
Table 1. NPF and PPF control performances simulated
( gnn = ca,n /cs,n ) and tested (reduction ratios RR(min) ).
Controller NPF PPF
Modal order(s) 1 2 [1, 2] 1 2 [1, 2]
gnn 6.3 6.9 [6.3, 6.9] 14.4 2.4 [14.4, 2.4]
RR(min) (dB) −15 −17 [−15, −17] −21 −10 [−21, −10]
achieve a 20 dB reduction, for example, the filter gain must be
ca = 9cs . If cs is small, ca does not have to be large. If cs is not
small, ca has to be large. Applying a large gain inevitably risks
the stability of the control system. The non-minimum phase
characteristics of the plant and the uncertainty at very high
frequencies, which are negligible when the gain is small, can
become very important. Here, note that, unlike low frequency
responses, very high frequency (asymptotic) responses of a
flexible structure may only be marginally (little) affected by
damping. Thus, increasing the mechanical damping may
not automatically suppress the threat to stability at very high
frequencies. To achieve a large reduction with a moderately
damped plant, an additional shaping filter (i.e., a low pass filter)
can be employed to minimize the threat to stability at very high
frequencies. However, it should be noted that this can cause
another threat to stability because of the transition region of
the shaping filter. Regarding robustness to a potential stability
threat at very high frequencies, PPF control (roll-off rate: ω−2 )
has an advantage over NPF control (roll-off rate: ω−1 ).
4. Conclusions
Control of the first two modes of a smart beam embedded with
a matched pair of PZT actuators and a collocated PVDF sensor
using two modal control methods, NPF and PPF control, has
been compared. It has been shown that NPF control is an
electrical realization of a dynamic vibration absorber. The
focus has been on the robustness of the two controllers and the
optimal parameters have been determined analytically, to give
the optimal performance for NPF control and a near-optimal
performance for PPF control. The experiments conducted with
a cantilever beam embedded with a matched pair of PZT patch
actuators and a collocated PVDF patch sensor demonstrate
that it is possible to realize an electrical dynamic absorber
using the generalized displacement sensor. It has been further
demonstrated that, with the particular plant tested, NPF has
particular advantages in terms of performance and stability
when multiple modes of a structure are controlled.
Appendix A. Equivalence of various realizations of
the electrical dynamic absorber
Figure A.1(a) illustrates the case when a single NPF filter
is used to control a single structural mode or a single DOF
oscillator (consisting of m s , cs , and ks ), where f p is the
external primary force, fc is the control force, and e is the
structural response after control. If the control filter is of
the form in equation (2), the filter can be represented by the
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S-M Kim et al
Figure A.1. NPF control of a single degree of freedom oscillator and
its analogous mechanical model.
Table A.1. Three different ways to realize the absorber in
figure A.1(b): PAF (position–acceleration feedback), VVF
(velocity–velocity feedback), and APF (acceleration–position
feedback). (Note: S = ωs2 − ω2 + j2ςs ωs ω, A =
ωa2 − ω2 + j2ςa ωa ω, 1/m s = ωs2 /ks = 2ςs ωs /cs , ka = m a ωa2 =
2ςa ωa ca , σ = m a /m
√ s , κ = ka /ks√
, g = ca /cs , ωs2 = ks /m s , ωa2 =
ka /m a , 2ςs = cs / m s ks , 2ςa = m a ka /ca,n .)
Structure G(jω) Absorber H (jω)
PAF (1/m s )S−1 ka (−ω2 )A−1
VVF (jω/m s )S−1 ka (jω)A−1
APF (−ω2 /m s )S−1 ka A−1
analogous mechanical model (consisting of m a , ca , and ka )
shown in figure A.1(b) [12]. The lower mass system is an
m  c  k system while the upper mass system is an m –c–
k system, where  denotes a parallel connection and − denotes
a serial connection, the damping ratios in equations (4a )
and (4b ) are correspondingly defined. The measured response
for the feedback controller can be displacement, velocity, or
acceleration. The corresponding controller forms that yield
the same open-loop gain in equation (7) as well as the same
analogous model in figure A.1(b) are given in table A.1
with the names: position–acceleration feedback (PAF) for
position feedback, velocity–velocity feedback (VVF) for
velocity feedback, and acceleration–position feedback (APF)
for acceleration feedback, where the PAF corresponds to NPF
in this paper. Note that the equivalence, ka = m a ωa2 =
2ςa ωa ca , enables convenient implementation of the filter in
terms of any of the parameters (m a , ca , and ka ). Table A.2
gives the continuous and discrete time responses of the three
filters in table A.1, where the discrete forms [12] are obtained
by applying the impulse invariant method. The discrete form is
used for the xPC target implementation discussed in the main
text. Once the filter gain h is known from analysis in which
h = ka , m a or ca , the digital gain in the xPC target controller is
determined by
K d = h(K T )−1 , (A.1)
where K = K a K s with the actuator and sensor gains K a and
K s , and T = Tact Tsen with the actuator and sensor sensitivities
Tact and Tsen , respectively.
Smart Mater. Struct. 20 (2011) 015011 S-M Kim et al

Table A.2. Continuous and discrete time responses of the absorbers in table A.1. (Note: ωd = ωa 1 − ζa2 , A(t) = exp(−ζa ωa t),

ϕ = tan−1 ( 1 − ςa2 /ςa ),  = z 2 − z 2e−ςωn T cos ωd T + A 2 , A = exp(−ζa ωa T ), and the sampling time is T = 1/Fs with Fs being the
sampling frequency.)
h(t) H (z)
1 1 z A sin ωd T
Pos. ka A(t) sin ωd t, ka
ωd ωd 

ωn ωn z(−z 1 − ςa2 + A sin(ωd T + ϕ))
Vol. −ka A(t) sin(ωd t − ϕ) −ka
ωd ω 
   d  
ω2 ωn2 z(−z 2ςa 1 − ςa2 + A sin(ωd T + 2ϕ))
Acc. ka δ(t) + n A(t) sin(ωd t − 2ϕ) ka 1 +
ωd ωd 


Appendix B. Maximally flat frequency response b= 2σ (1 − m)m −2 , (B.5)
strategy
where m = 1 √
2
− r . Equations (B.3) and (B.5) are equated
2

This appendix is a summary of the part of [11] that is applicable
to this paper. Consider the two DOF vibration system shown in
figure A.1(b) and assume that ωa = ωs . The coupled structural
mobility (the velocity e of the lower mass system to force fp ,
after attachment of the upper mass system) can be written as
e 1 a(b + jx)
YCS (jx) = = , (B.1)
fp cs (a + jx)(b + jx) + σ
where σ = m a /m s , cs , a and b are defined in the main text
and x =  − −1 is a normalized frequency bandwidth.
Den Hartog’s fixed-point theory [6] with the aim of achieving
the maximally flat coupled mobility FRF response can be
described mathematically by
|YCS (0)| = |YCS (jx c )|, (B.2)
where the normalized
√ bandwidth between the two fixed points
is given by x c = ν + (σ/2) in which ν = ab . Combining
equations (B.1) and (B.2) gives
√ piezoelectric sensor and actuator pair for vibration control of
b = 2σ . (B.3)
Since σ = κ with the assumption ωa = ωs , equation (14)
in the main text is determined. The normalized optimal filter
gain g = ca /cs for a given bandwidth b , which achieves the
best performance without violating the robustness constraint
of degree r , is given by
 [11] Kim S M, Wang S and Brennan M J 2011 Dynamic analysis
g = ((η + 1)(1 − r 2 )/r 2 )(1 + 1 − r 2 ((η − 1)/(η + 1))),
(B.4)
where η = μ/ν in which μ = (a 2 + b 2 )/2 and ν = ab .
Rearranging equation (B.4) with assuming a b gives
when r 2 = ( 5 − 1)/2, which corresponds to a control
spillover of about 2 dB.
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