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Computer-Aided Implementation of Graphical Root Locus Design Recipes

M. Sami Fadali, Senior Member, IEEE
fadali@ee.unr.edu

Abstract - Root locus design is an inherently iterative process by which the poles and zeros of a system are selected to provide a desirable time response. However, trial and error can be greatly reduced using graphical design recipes. With the advent of computer-aided design (CAD) tools, most of the graphical recipes lost their appeal. We provide procedures for the computer implementation of graphical s-domain design recipes. The procedures can be implemented using any computer-aided design package. We discuss lead, lag, lag-lead, PI, PD and PID control. Examples are provided.

I. Introduction

Control system design was revolutionized by the introduction of the root locus technique [1].  The technique allows the designer to conveniently select the poles and zeros of the closed-loop system.  Because the poles and zeros determine the time response of the system, the designer is able to select the desired system behavior using root locus design.  The following years witnessed the appearance of several graphical recipes for compensator design based on root locus plots which are standard material in most control texts (see for example [2], [3]).  These recipes allow the placement of the dominant closed-loop poles (i.e. poles that correspond to the slowly decaying time response terms [2, p. 231]) at desired locations. They represent years of experience by ingenious control engineers.

With the advent of digital computers, several authors provided computer-aided design recipes for root locus compensation (see for example [4], [5] ) and many of the old  recipes lost their appeal because of their reliance on graphical root locus construction. However, the root locus method never lost its popularity among control engineers and their computer-aided-design packages typically include commands to obtain root locus plots. It is even possible to obtain root locus plots using a hand-held calculator [6].  Some authors have proposed the use of expert systems in root locus design in lieu of the graphical recipes [7]. This approach could provide useful assistance to designers but is still at an early stage of development. We believe that design is inherently an iterative process facilitated by computer tools but relying on the wisdom embodied in the old graphical design recipes. Nevertheless, there is a need to computerize some of the cumbersome steps involved in the design recipes for them to regain their popularity. Surprisingly, we have found few attempts to do so in the literature [8].

This paper is an attempt to provide a comprehensive treatment of all standard compensators that adapts graphical recipes for computer implementation.  We show that many of the standard recipes for root locus compensator design can be easily adapted for computer implementation and provide simple procedures for control system design. Lag, lead and lag-lead controllers are discussed. PI, PD and PID control are shown to be special cases of lag, lead and lag-lead control, respectively. We use the CAD package  MATLAB, but other packages have similar commands and can be used with the same design procedures.

Throughout the paper, we use the notation of Table 1.

Table 1. Nomenclature

Symbol Definition
dz(dp) distance from the compensator zero (pole) to the desired closed-loop pole location
Gc(s) compensator transfer function
K compensator gain
Ke error constant
Kd , Ki , Kp derivative, integral, and proportional gain, respectively
L(s) loop gain function
p compensator pole location
r ratio of pole distance to zero distance from the desired closed-loop pole location
s Laplace complex variable
scl desired closed-loop pole location
T compensator time constant
x ratio of zero to undamped natural frequency for lag compensator
z compensator zero location
a pole-zero ratio for lead compensator
b pole-zero ratio for lag compensator
g parameter used to define the zero location for a PI controller
f angle deficit at the desired closed-loop pole location
qz (qp) compensator zero (pole) angle at the desired closed-loop pole location
wd damped natural frequency in rad/s.
wn undamped natural frequency in rad/s.
z damping ratio
|s| Ðs magnitude and angle of a complex number s

The basic idea underlying root locus plots is the fact that the closed-loop characteristic equation of the system is the complex equality

where K is a variable gain parameter.  The equality yields two conditions: Root locus design is essentially a set of recipes to alter the locations where the conditions are satisfied (the closed-loop poles) so as to obtain a system with the desired time response.  This is accomplished by introducing poles and/or zeros in the control loop thereby changing the loop gain L(scl ).  The two conditions are used extensively throughout the paper.

II. Lead Design

Consider the lead compensator
(2.1)
where T is the compensator time constant.  The compensator is added to the control loop together with a gain K to improve the transient  response of the system by placing the closed-loop poles at desired locations.  The compensator introduces a zero at - 1/T and a pole at -1/aT

Let the desired closed-loop pole location be scl = | scl | Ðqcl .  For all points off the root locus the angle differs from  180° by an angle we refer to as the angle deficit.  Prior to adding the compensator, the angle deficit at the desired closed-loop pole location is
f = - 180° - ÐL(scl)
(2.2)
By adding the compensator to the control loop, we obtain an angle of +/-180° at the desired pole location  scl .  For a lead design, we require the angle at the zero qz (numerator angle)and the angle at the poleqp (denominator angle) to satisfyqz -qp = f .  If the location of the zero is fixed, then the location of the pole can be determined.  The location of the zero can be selected by one of the following methods.
 

a) Choose a zero to approximately cancel the closest plant pole to the jw -axis (excluding poles at the origin).  Let the pole to be
    canceled be at -p1, then the zero angle and the pole angle are given by

 
      qz = Ð (scl + p1)
      (2.3)
      qp = qz- f = Ð (scl + p1)-f
      (2.4)
      qz = 90°
      (2.5)
      qp = qz- f = 90° -f
      (2.6)
c) Use a geometrical construction to select a pole and zero of minimum ratio a.  A proof of the minimum aproperty for this design can be found in [9]. Consider the geometric construction of Figure 1.  The origin O is connected to scl and a parallel to the real axis from scl  is drawn to A. The angle O-scl-A is bisected by the line scl-B.

. 
Figure 1 Pole-zero diagram of lead controller.
Click to see Figure 1

From the geometry, we have
qz = qcl- (qcl -f )/2 = (qcl + f )/2
(2.7)
qp = qz- f = (qcl -f )/2
(2.8)
From Figure 1, we observe that the tangents of qz and qp , respectively, are

Hence, we evaluate the zero and the pole using
(2.9)
(2.10)
 Finally, we calculate the gain K from the magnitude condition as applied to the system after the introduction of the lead compensator
(2.11)
The above analysis yields the following procedure for lead compensator design:

Procedure 1

  1. Calculate the desired location of the closed-loop dominant pair.
  2. Determine the angle of the loop gain at the desired closed-loop pole location and calculate the compensator angle using (2.2).
  3. Determine the location of the zero using (2.3-4), (2.5-6) or (2.7-8), together with (2.9).
  4. Determine the location of the pole using (2.10).
  5. Determine the gain using the magnitude condition (2.11) at the location of the closed-loop pole.


A. PD Design

As a special case of lead design we consider proportional-derivative or PD control
Gc(s) = K(s + z) 
(2.12)
We obtain a PD compensator by letting the pole of the lead compensator migrate far in the left half plane so that its angle contribution is negligible.  Using the angle condition, we now require the angle at the zero to satisfy q z = f.  The location of the zero can be calculated from
(2.13)
Alternatively, one may approximately cancel the closest L(s) pole p1 with the compensator zero , i.e. z = p1, and use qz = | Ð (s + p1) |. In either case, the controller gain is obtained from the formula
(2.14)
and the design can be completed using Procedure 1 with minor modifications.

III. Lag Design

The general form of a lag compensator is
(3.1)
The lag transfer function is similar to that of the lead compensator with the parameter a now replaced by the parameter b > 1 and with a gain equal to  b.   A lag compensator is typically used to improve the steady-state response for a system whose transient response is acceptable with the appropriate gain adjustment. Most CAD packages allow the variation of the gain to select a suitable design point.  For example, one could use the root locus cursor commands of PROGRAM CC or the MATLAB command rlocfind.

The lag compensator reduces the steady-state error by the factor b but introduces a negative angle that shifts the root locus to the right resulting in a slower time response.  To minimize the latter harmful effect, the lag pole and zero are located close to the imaginary axis so that their net angle contribution is small.  If the initial choice of closed-loop pole is conservative, then the small shift to the right due to the lag section is minimal and is corrected for by a small gain adjustment.  The angle contribution of the PI controller is obtained next.

Theorem 1. A PI controller with the zero location specified by
(3.2)
where has an angle contribution f .

Proof:
To prove (3.2), we use the pole-zero diagram of Figure 2. The figure shows the angle contribution of the controller at the closed-loop pole location scl. The contribution of the open loop gain L(s) is not needed and is not shown.


Figure 2. Pole-zero diagram of lag controller.
 Click to see Figure 2

The controller angle at scl is

From Figure 2, the tangents of the two angles in the RHS of the above equation are

where x is the ratio ( z/ wn ). Next we use the trigonometric identity to obtain Because f is a negative angle, we have
(3.3)
We now have the quadratic Solving for x, we obtain the admissible solution which is equivalent to (3.2). Equation (3.2) is rather cumbersome but can be replaced by the simpler choice
(3.4)
Figure 3 shows the resulting compensator angles for different z and b values. The plots show that |f|is less than 5° for underdamped system with practical values of the two parameters.

Figure 3. Plot of the controller angle magnitude |f | at the underdamped closed-loop pole versus z for
b =2, 4, 6, 8, 10,12. The arrow indicates the direction of increasing b.
 Click to see Figure 3

The following procedure yields a lag compensator that reduces the steady state error by a factor b.

Procedure 2

  1. Improve the transient response using proportional control and obtain the corresponding gain K and closed-loop pole location scl = - zwn + jwd.
  2. Calculate the steady-state error using Kand obtain the required improvement in the steady-state error b .
  3. Select the compensator zero using (3.2) or (3.4).
  4. Adjust the compensator gain to return the closed-loop pole closer to the desired location.
 The compensator transfer function is
(3.5)

A. PI Design

This is a special case of lag design where the controller pole is at the origin and the transfer function is
(3.6)

The compensator zero can sometimes be used to cancel a pole and obtain a good design. More often, a better design is obtained using Procedure 2, with minor modifications.

We first observe that for PI control, the zero-pole ratio is infinite and (3.3) with infinite b reduces to

Then we solve for z to obtain
(3.7)

As in lag design, using (3.3) to choose the zero gives a small angle contribution and a simpler design. This is verified by the plot of the angle versus z shown in Figure 4. The figure shows that the |f | is less than 3° for almost any underdamped system.

Figure 4. Plot of the controller angle f at the underdamped closed-loop pole versus z for PI control.
 Click to see Figure 4
IV. Lag-Lead Design

In situations where both an improvement in the transient response and a significant reduction in steady-state error are needed, neither a lag nor a lead compensator will suffice. We need a compensator, which includes a lead as well as a lag section known as a lag-lead compensator. The lead section is added to shift the closed-loop pole to the left in a location that corresponds to an improved transient response. The lag section is added so that the perturbation of the closed-loop pole is minimal but its location corresponds to a larger error constant i.e. a reduced steady-state error. Thus, we are able to improve both the transient and steady-state response using a lag-lead compensator.

The general form of a lag-lead compensator is
(4.1)

 Two cases can be considered.

  1. a b¹1: In this case, lag-lead design can be accomplished by designing a lead compensator to improve the transient response and then improving its steady-state response by adding a lag compensator. Because the lag compensator will cause deterioration in the transient response, it is advisable to use a somewhat conservative lead design.
  2. a b =1:    This constraint allows the implementation of the compensator using a simple passive circuit.  It is possible to desing the compensator subject to the constraint by following the procedure in (a) using a suitable value such as a =0.1 and modifying it until an acceptable design is obtained. To reduce trial and error, we prefer to develop a different design procedure as in [2].  We first prove some properties of the lead section.
    3.  
Theorem 2. Given a lead section with angle contribution f . If the distance from the desired closed-loop pole to the lead pole and zero is
(4.2)
Then the zero and pole of the lead section have the angles
(4.3)
(4.4)
The zero and pole are located at
(4.5)
(4.6)
Proof:
Refer to Figure 1 and use basic trigonometric relations to obtain

where we assume that qzis a first or second quadrant angle.

Using q p = f + q z , we eliminate q p or to obtain

We now solve for tan(qz) The above equation gives (4.3). Similarly, we solve for tan(qp ).

Substituting in (2.9-10) gives (4.5-6), respectively.
 

To find the ratio r in terms of the error constant Ke , we apply the magnitude condition to the compensated loop gain at the desired closed-loop. We substitute an approximate value of unity for the lag section to obtain
 
(4.7)

 The approximate magnitude of the lag section is slightly greater than its actual value so that the actual Ke obtained is slightly better than the desired value.  However, the lag section contributes a negative angle of 3-5° . We therefore use an angle f = - 180° - ÐL(scl ) + 3-5° to obtain the desired closed-loop poles.  We now have the following procedure which is imilar to that of [8].

Procedure 3

  1. Calculate the error constant for the system with proportional control and calculate the needed gain change to meet the steady-state error requirements.
  2. Obtain the ratio r of the pole distance to the zero distance for the lead section using (4.7).
  3. Calculate the angle contribution of the lead section using the angle condition at the desired pole location. Let the angle contribution be f = - 180°-ÐL(scl) + 3-5° .
  4. Obtain the pole and zero locations for the lead section using equations (4.3-6).
  5. Add a lag section with b= 1/a = p/z where p and z are the pole and zero or the lead section.
  6. Check the error constant and the pole locations for the design.
 A. PID Design
The transfer function of a PID controller is
 
 
(4.8)
where the proportional gain is Kp= 2zwn , and the integral gain is . The gain of the compensator is the derivative gain Kd . The roots of the numerator or controller zeros can be real or complex conjugate depending on the choice of design parameters. The zeros can be used to almost cancel slow dynamics whether they arise from real or complex conjugate poles. Alternatively, one zero can be added using the PD design procedure then the rest of the compensator can be added using the PI design procedure. This latter approach is due to the fact that the PID controller is a special case of lag-lead control with the lag pole at the origin and the lead pole migrating to infinity. Hence, it can be designed using Procedure 3 with the lead design replaced by PD design and the lag design replaced by PI design.
V. Examples
We now apply the lead, lag and lag-lead design procedures.
 

Example 1: Lead Design [2, p.413-416]
Design a lead compensator for the transfer function

to obtain closed-loop dominant poles with a damping ratio z of 0.5 and an undamped natural frequencywn of 4.
Solution
We follow Procedure 1. 1- We calculate the desired location for the closed-loop dominant pair to be at s=-2+j*2*sqrt(3)
s = -2.0000 + 3.4641i   The angle of the loop gain at the desired closed-loop pole location is phi=-180+angle( s*(s+2))*180/pi
phi = -330 2- The actual angle contribution is positive and is obtained by adding 360° phi =phi+360phirad=phi*pi/180
phi = 30 phirad = 0.5236 3- The zero is chosen using (2.9) thetarad=pi-acos(.5)theta=thetarad*180/piz=-real(s)+imag(s)/tan((thetarad+phirad)/2)
thetarad = 2.0944 theta = 120.0000 z = 2.9282 4- The location of the pole, using (2.10), is p=-real(s)+imag(s)/tan((thetarad-phirad)/2)
p = 5.4641 We select a zero at -2.9 and a pole at -5.5.  Thus, we have a = 2.9/5.5 = 0.527 5- The gain is obtained from the magnitude condition (2.11) at the location of the closed-loop pole. s=-2+j*2*sqrt(3)K=abs(s*(s+2)*(s+5.5)/(s+2.9))
s = -2.0000 + 3.4641i K = 19.0648 s = -2.0000 + 3.4641i K = 19.0648 The compensator transfer function is The results of the calculations are almost identical to those of [1]. The root locus of the compensated system is given in Figure 5.

Figure 5. Root locus of lead-compensated system (+ = closed-loop pole for K = 19).
 Click to see Figure 5
The figure shows the closed-loop poles for a gain of 19. The system has two dominant poles close to the desired locations and a third pole close to a zero. The step response of the system is given in Figure 6.

Figure 6. Step response for lead design.
 Click to see Figure 6
Example 2: Lag Design
Add a lag section to the results of Example 1 to reduce the steady-state error by a factor of 3.
Solution:
We follow Procedure 2.
  1. The first step was accomplished in Example 1, resulting in the loop gain

  2. The required improvement in the steady-state error is b = 3.
  3. The compensator zero is given by (3.4)
and the compensator transfer function (3.1) is The overall compensator for the system is a lag-lead controller with a ¹1/band is given by The step responses for lag and for lead compensation are shown in Figure 7. The figure shows that, in spite of the placement of the lag pole and zero to contribute a small angle, the lag compensator causes significant increase in the overshoot. This may be reduced by trial and error but better results are obtained in the next example.
Figure 7. Step response for lag and lead compensation.
 Click to see Figure 7.
 Example 3: Lag-Lead Design
Design a lag-lead compensator for the system of Example 1 with a = b to obtain the same closed-loop pole locations as Example 1 and error constant as Example 2 (about 30).
Solution:
We follow Procedure 3.
  1. The desired error constant for the system is about 30.
  2. Equation (4.7) with Ke =30 and with the magnitude of the lag section » 1 gives the ratio
s=-2+j*2*sqrt(3)r=30/abs(s*(s+2))
s = -2.0000 + 3.4641i r = 2.1651
  1. The angle contribution of the lead section is
phi=-180+angle( s*(s+2 ) )*180/pi
phi = -330 The actual angle contribution is positive and is obtained by adding 360° . An additional 4° is added to correct for the effect of the lag section. The compensator angle is therefore phi=phi+364phirad=phi*pi/180
phi = 34 phirad = 0.5934
  1. The pole and zero of the lead section are at
zlead=-real(s)+imag(s)*(cos(phirad)-1/r)/sin(phirad)plead=-real(s)+imag(s)*(r-cos(phirad))/sin(phirad)tlead=1/zleadalphat=1/plead
zlead = 4.2745 plead = 10.2764 tlead = 0.2339 alphat = 0.0973
  1. Add a lag section with b= 1/a.
beta=plead/zleadzlag=-real(s)/10plag=zlag/betatlag=1/zlagtbeta=beta*tlag
beta = 2.4041 zlag = 0.2000 plag = 0.0832 tlag = 5 tbeta = 12.0207 The compensator transfer function is The root locus for the compensated system is obtained next. We first transform the transfer function to a ratio of polynomials using [num,den]= zp2tf([-4.27;-.2],[-10.28;-0.08;-2.0;0],1)
num = 0 0 1.0000 4.4700 0.8540 den = 1.0000 12.3600 21.5424 1.6448 0


The root locus is plotted using the MATLAB command rlocus or the PROGRAM CC command root. The closed-loop poles are close to the desired location for a gain of 30.

Figure 8. Root locus of system with lag-lead control (+=poles for K=30).
 Click to see Figure 8.
The step response of the system is shown in Figure 9.

Figure 9. Step response of the system with lag-lead control and with lead control.
 Click to see Figure 9
VI. Conclusion
Although root locus design must involve some trial and error in practice, a good first design is obtained using simple rules of thumb. We have shown how graphical construction can be completely eliminated without sacrificing the design rules of thumb to obtain procedures implementable with standard CAD design programs. Using MATLAB, for example, each design recipe can be implemented using a suitable function or "m-file". In addition, the design steps can be implemented using a hand-held calculator with the aid of the root locus plots that are now available on some calculators.
References
  1. W. B. Evans, "Graphical Analysis of Control Systems", Tans. AIEE, Vol. 67, pp. 547-551, 1948.
  2. K. Ogata, Modern Control Engineering, 3rd Ed., Prentice-Hall, Upper Saddle River, NJ, 1997.
  3. J. J. D'Azzo and C. H. Houpis, Linear Control System Analysis and Design: Conventional and Modern", McGraw-Hill, NY, 1995.
  4. D.K. Frederick and J. H. Chow, Feedback Control Problems Using MATLAB and the Control System Toolbox, PWS, Boston, MA, 1995.
  5. N. E. Leonard and W. S. Levine,  Using MATLAB to Analyze and Design Control Systems, Benamin/Cummings, Redwood City, CA, 1995.
  6. B. K Theon, "HP-15C Program Calculates Root Locus", Electronic Design, Vol. 31, May, pp. 202-204, 1983.
  7. P. A. Muha, "Expert System for SROOT", IEE Prod.-D, Vol. 138, No. 4, pp. 381-387, 1991.
  8. M. C. M. Teixeira, "Direct Expressions for Ogata's Lead-Lag Design Method Using Root Locus", IEEE Trans. Educ., Vol. 37, No. 1, pp. 63-64, Feb. 1994.
  9. R. Unnikrishnan, "Design of a Lead Compensator with Minimum Attenuation", Int. J. Eng. Educ., Vol. 17, No. 1, pp. 85-88, 1980.
Author Contact Information
URL: http://www.ee.unr.edu/publish/fadali/fadali.html
EE Dept. MS260, University of Nevada, Reno, NV89557
Phone: 775-784-6951Fax: 775-784-6627
email: fadali@ee.unr.edu
Author Biography
M. Sami Fadali is a Professor of Electrical Engineering at the University of Nevada, Reno. He earned his BS in Electrical Engineering from Cairo University in 1974, MS in Control from UMIST in 1977 and Ph. D. in Bioengineering from University of Wyoming in 1980. He was an Asistant Professor at King Abdul Aziz University, Jeddah from 1981-83 where he participated in starting a Biomedical Engineering Program. From 1984-85 he was a Post Doctoral Fellow at Colorado State University. He joined the Electrical Engineering at the University of Nevada in 1985. His research interests are in robust control, fault detection, engineering education and physiological modeling.

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