Rapid retargetting of a flexible pointing system with structure mounted sensors and actuators

In this paper, active control of flexible structures through utilization of structure mounted sensors and actuators is considered. Specifically, dynamic feedback design utilizing signals from the accelerometer mounted on the structure is discussed. Furthermore, utilization of piezoceramics for sensing and actuation to provide a higher level of control for vibration damping is investigated. The flexible pointing system considered here is the test-bed at the Army Research Development Engineering Center (ARDEC), which is a scaled-down representation of real-life targeting systems. This setup is also a nice benchmark problem for system identification and different control design philosophies. The approaches advocated here are based on Youla's parameterization of stabilizing controllers, Wiener-Hopf design and decentralized frequency shaping. Modelling aspects for the setup, taking all the structural intricacies into account, are discussed. The preliminary results indicate a significant improvement in performance through utilization of these control schemes.