University of Baghdad Automatic Control Engineering College of Engineering
Mechanical Engg. Dept. 2021-2022 Assist. [Link]. Karim H. Ali
Chapter 1
Introduction To Automatic Controls
What is control: Control is the process of changing, manually or automatically, the
performance of a system to be desired one. It is a series of actions directed for making a
variable system adheres to a reference value (that might be either constant or variable).
Why control: Because systems by themselves usually do not behave the way we would like
them to be.
Control Objectives:
1. Safety
2. Environmental Protection
3. Equipment Protection
4. Smooth Plant Operation and Production Rate
5. Product Quality
6. Profit Optimization
7. Monitoring and Diagnosis
Historical Development:
Energy should be supplied for doing work and accomplish functions, so early people had
relied upon their own brute strength or that of beasts of burden.
Simple mechanical devices such as wheels and levers were used to accomplish immortal
feats like building of high pyramids by Egyptians and Roman highways and aqueducts.
Early people began to satisfy the increasingly growth in their demands by utilizing
power from natural sources such as winds for powering sailing vessels and windmills,
also waterfalls were used for turning water wheels.
Invention of Steam engine was a milestone in human progress because it provided
people with useful power that could be used at will.
Since then, many different means have been devised for obtaining convenient sources
of energy while engineers design and develop machines and equipment.
High performance and desired output of machines and equipment could be maintained
by utilizing suitable control devices while early machines used control means
(controllers) of a manual nature as shown in Figure 1.
Development of control engineering provides machines and equipment with high
performance control devices (controllers) in which automatic controls relieve people of
many monotonous activities. Also modern complex controls can perform functions
beyond the physical abilities of people.
It is well known that as applications and uses of control devices (controllers) have
increased, also the demands upon the performance of these control systems increased.
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University of Baghdad Automatic Control Engineering College of Engineering
Mechanical Engg. Dept. 2021-2022 Assist. [Link]. Karim H. Ali
Cold Fluid Input
water
Hot Fluid Output
water
Figure 1 Manual control systems of regulating temperature of water and level of fluid
in tank by adjusting input valve
Terminology:
System: is a collection of components and processes coordinated together to perform a
function in which system could be described as a block diagram as shown in Figure.
Input Output
System
Systems may be mechanical, electrical, chemical, heating, air-conditioning, and here are some
examples,
1. The process of filling tank with water is a mechanical system in which water flow rate
is an input while H height of water is output as shown in Figure.
System
Water H
H
Input Tank Output
2. Process of driving a car is a mechanical system in which fuel is input while speed is
output as shown in Figure.
System
Fuel Car Speed
Input Engine Output
3. Input of automatic traffic (signal) system at roadway intersections is the electric
power and output is the colored signal light as shown in Figure.
System
Electric Power Colored Light
Traffic
Input (Signal) Light Output
Control System (System with Controller):
A control system or system with controller is an interconnection or an arrangement of
physical components connected in such a manner to form a system configuration that will
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University of Baghdad Automatic Control Engineering College of Engineering
Mechanical Engg. Dept. 2021-2022 Assist. [Link]. Karim H. Ali
provide a desired response. A control system is designed to achieve a specified desired
purpose like speed control system of Watt’s Fly weight governor as shown in Figure 2.
Figure 2 Watt’s Fly weight governor, invented by Watt in 18th Century used to control
speed of the steam engine
In order to identify or define a control system, two terms should be introduced:
1. Input: is the stimulus, excitation or command signal applied to control system. Inputs
could be physical variables or abstract ones such as reference, set point or desired
values for the output of the control systems.
2. Output: is the actual response resulting from a control system in which it may or may
not be equal to the specified response implied by the input.
Input and output represent desire and the actual response respectively as shown in Figure.
Input: Stimulus Control Output: Response
(Reference Inputs) (Controlled Variable)
Desired Output System Actual Response
Response
Control System Configurations:
1. Open-loop control system: A control type that computes its input into a system using
only the current state. It does not use feedback to determine whether its output has
achieved the expected goal. An open-loop control system utilizes a controller or
control actuator to obtain the desired response as shown in Figure:
Process or Output
Input
Component
(Process or Component to be Controlled)
Controller System to be Controlled
Desired Output
Response Actuating Process or Output
Reference Device Component
Input
(Open-loop Control System without Feedback)
3
University of Baghdad Automatic Control Engineering College of Engineering
Mechanical Engg. Dept. 2021-2022 Assist. [Link]. Karim H. Ali
There are many examples of open-loop control system such as electric ovens, gas ring, water
tap, traffic signals, washing machine, electric fan, irrigation sprinkler system, electric motor,
and manual operation of the accelerator in automobile.
Closed-loop control system: A type of control system that manually or automatically
changes the output according to the difference between feedback and input signals. In
contrast to an open-loop control system, a closed-loop utilizes an additional measure of the
actual output to compare with the desired output response as shown in Figure.
Process or Output
Input
Component
(Process or Component to be Controlled)
Controller System to be Controlled
Desired Output
Actuating Process or Output
Response
Comparison
Reference Device Component Controlled
Input Variable
Measurement
Closed-Loop Feedback Control System (with feedback)
Examples of closed loop control system such as heating and air-conditioning systems, DC
servo motor, speed control system, filling tank with water using float, tension-regulating
apparatus used in paper industry.
Feedback Control System: A control system in which the value of some output quantity is
controlled by measuring and feeding back the value of it so as to bring this value closer to a
desired one. Also it is known as closed-loop control system such as speed control system
which is shown in Figure 3.
Fly-weight Governor
Desired Actual
Speed Steam Steam Speed
Metal Sphere Valv Output
Reference Engine
Input e
Output Shaft
Closed-Loop Feedback Speed Control System (with feedback)
Effect of feedback control system:
Reduce Error between the actual and desired value.
Change the stability of the system.
Change overall system gain.
Change sensitivity of the system gain.
Reduce effects of external disturbance.
Reduce effect of variations of system parameters.
4
University of Baghdad Automatic Control Engineering College of Engineering
Mechanical Engg. Dept. 2021-2022 Assist. [Link]. Karim H. Ali
Classification of Feedback Control System:
Feed back control systems are divided into two classes:
1. Servomechanism: A servomechanism is a power-amplifying feedback control system in
which the controlled variable is a mechanical position or a time derivative of position
such as velocity or acceleration. An automatic aircraft landing system is an example of
servomechanism.
2. Regulators. A regulator is a feedback control system in which the reference input or
command is constant for long periods of time such input is known as set point. Most
temperature controllers are regulators.
Examples of Control Systems:
Many applications could be found for control systems in science, industry, and home. Here
are a few examples:
1. xResidential heating and air-conditioning systems controlled by a thermostat (closed-
loop control system) as shown in Figure.
2. The cruise (speed) control of an automobile (closed-loop control system) as shown in
Figure.
3. Position control in a human lib (closed-loop control system) as shown in Figure.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
4. Temperature control system (closed-loop control system) as shown in Figure.
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University of Baghdad Automatic Control Engineering College of Engineering
Mechanical Engg. Dept. 2021-2022 Assist. [Link]. Karim H. Ali
Desired Temperature
Temperature
Operator Valve Mixer Furnace
Input Output
Measurement
5. Automobile steering control system (closed-loop control system) as shown in Figure.
6. Control of traffic lights (open-loop control system) as shown in Figure.
Colored
Lights
Command Traffic Lights
Computer Switch
Input Output
7. Activation of a light switch to regulate the illumination in a room
8. Human controlling the speed of an automobile by regulating gas supply to the engine
9. Automatic traffic control (signal) system at roadway intersections
10. Automatically control system turns on a room lamp at dusk, and turns it off in day light
11. Automatic hot water heater
12. Environmental test-chamber temperature control system
13. An automatic positioning system for a missile launcher
14. An automatic speed control for a field-controlled dc motor
15. The attitude control system of a typical space vehicle
6
University of Baghdad Automatic Control Engineering College of Engineering
Mechanical Engg. Dept. 2021-2022 Assist. [Link]. Karim H. Ali
16. Automatic position-control system of a high speed automated train system
17. An elevator-position control system used in high-rise multilevel buildings.
System Representation:
Mathematical relationships of control elements are usually represented by block diagram
where inputs and outputs are described by arrows. Overall block diagram representation for
an entire system can be constructed by combining block diagrams for each component of the
system.
Block: Any component or process to be controlled can be represented by a block which
is described as a box refers to multiplication operation. A block may be a set of
elements described by an input/output relationship as shown in Figure.
Input Control Output
Element
Comparator: is represented by a circle refers to the
r
summing operation which makes a comparison between
feedback signal (b) and reference input (r) while an Reference Actuating
actuating signal (e) may be existed according to the Input Signal
difference between feedback signal (b) and reference b
input (r) as shown in Figure.
Control Elements: Portion of a control system between the actuating signal (e) and the
controlled variable (c) is called the control elements as shown in Figure.
e c
G(D)
Actuating Controlled
Signal Variable
And, ( )
Where, G(D) represents mathematical differential equations of operation that
represents input and output relationship. Also it is called as the transfer function and
could be calculated as,
( )
Complete block diagram: complete over all block diagram representation for the whole
control system with single input single output (SISO) could be described generally as
shown in Figure.
Control System
( ) ( )
Reference ( ) Controlled
input اكتبالمعادلةهنا variable
Feedback elements
( )
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University of Baghdad Automatic Control Engineering College of Engineering
Mechanical Engg. Dept. 2021-2022 Assist. [Link]. Karim H. Ali
Where, H(D) represents mathematical differential equations of operation for
feedback elements. Also complete over all block diagram representation for the whole
control system with two inputs single output (MISO) could be described generally as shown
in Figure.
Disturbance Signal
اكتبالمعادلةهنا
Disturbance
function elements Controlled
Control
elements Controlled System variable
Reference ( ) ( )
( ) اكتبالمعادلةهنا ( )
input اكتبالمعادلةهنا
اكتبالمعادلةهنا
اكتبالمعادلةهنا
Feedback elements
( )