Network delay predictive compensation based on time-delay modelling as disturbance

Abstract

In this paper, a control design methodology that can assure the closed-loop performances of a physical plant, while compensating the network-induced time-varying delays, is proposed. First, the error caused by the time-varying delays is modelled as a disturbance and a novel method of bounding the disturbance is proposed. Second, a robust one step ahead predictive controller based on flexible control Lyapunov functions is designed, which explicitly takes into account the bounds of the disturbances and guarantees also the input-to-state stability of the system in a non-conservative way. The methodology was tested on a vehicle drivetrain controlled through controller area network, with the aim of damping driveline oscillations. The comparison with a proportional-integral-derivative (PID) controller using TrueTime simulator shows that the proposed control scheme can outperform classical controllers and it can handle the performance/physical constraints. Moreover, the handling of the strict limitations on the computational complexity was tested using a real-time test-bench.

Keywords:

• networked control systems
• time-varying delays
• network disturbance
• predictive control
• drivetrain oscillations damping