Fractional-Order PI Controller Design Based on Reference–to–Disturbance Ratio

Abstract

The presence of disturbances in practical control engineering applications is unavoidable. At the same time, they drive the closed-loop system’s response away from the desired behavior. For this reason, the attenuation of disturbance effects is a primary goal of the control loop. Fractional-order controllers have now been researched intensively in terms of improving the closed-loop results and robustness of the control system, compared to the standard integer-order controllers. In this study, a novel tuning method for fractional-order controllers is developed. The tuning is based on improving the disturbance attenuation of periodic disturbances with an estimated frequency. For this, the reference–to–disturbance ratio is used as a quantitative measure of the control system’s ability to reject disturbances. Numerical examples are included to justify the approach, quantify the advantages and demonstrate the robustness. The simulation results provide for a validation of the proposed tuning method.