Speed and Position Control for a Hydraulic Rotary Motor

SPEED AND POSITION CONTROL FOR A HYDRAULIC

ROTARY MOTOR
Mihai Avram, Victor Constantin, Ciprian Ion Rizescu
Politehnica University of Bucharest
Splaiul Independenței, nr. 313, Bucharest, Romania
E-mail: mavram02@yahoo.com

Abstract – The paper focuses on speed and position control for a hydraulic rotary motor and tries to
bring light on this very important subject featuring new information on this subject. This work shows
results obtained by a research team in Politehnica University of Bucharest over the last years and
explores old and new concepts in the field of hydraulics.

Keywords: Pneutronic systems, speed and position control, hydraulic rotary motor.

1. Introduction It is also important that the system operating parameters

must be very well established [2 ] .
Fluid actuating systems have a certain number of This paper presents a positioning system with
advantages such as: small size dimensions and low hydraulic rotary motor . It is equipped with an electronic
weight per power unit , low inertia , easy reversing the microcontroller . Main advantages of this system may
direction of movement and free shock and vibration include lower system response time and the freedom in
operation . The speed driven load can be controlled with choosing the appropriate algorithm for operating.
high precision , which allows to obtain optimum speed
curve and also can provide positioning accuracy. 2. System Overview
It is necessary , however, be taken into account a
number of disadvantages that influence the positioning The system presented here is a starting point
accuracy: variation with temperature of the operating model existing in our laboratory: Robotics, Actuations
fluid viscosity, fluid loss by sealing and also high and Precise Automation Systems, from the Faculty of
technological difficulties encountered at proportional Mechanical Engineering and Mechatronics, University
hydraulics equipment. These disadvantages can be Politehnica of Bucharest [1]. Hydraulic functional
partially compensated by using an appropriate electronic diagram of the basic system is shown in Figure 1 and
control unit and by implementing dedicated algorithms. the experimental setup designed and built in Figure 2.

LA
FP-AI-V10B

BV FP-AI-100 FP-DO-403 FP-AO-210

FP-1000
IE
W
(1a) (3) (6) (1) (17)
xe,RELEU

xi,n xe,2 xe,1

Tn
i1
AEDHP
C i2

MHR
xi,pA xi,pB

TPA TPB
A B DHP

i1 i2

EMP1 P T EMP2

Fig.1 Functional diagram Fig.2 Experimental setup

The Romanian Review Precision Mechanics, Optics & Mechatronics, 2014, No. 45 63
 Speed and Position Control for a Hydraulic Rotary Motor

With this experimental setup it is possible to to the speed transducer, already presented, it is replaced
track in real-time the angular speed variations of the with an incremental angular position transducer Tp .
rotary hydraulic motor shaft and also the motor active The hydraulic motor is the rotary motor orbital
cameras pressures. type, "Danfoss", this motor has the following
The control system program was developed and characteristic: ensure regular movement even at low
implemented in LabVIEW 2013 environment. angular speeds, constant torque for a wide range of
The positioning system is shown in Figure 3 . rotational speeds , high starting torque, high efficiency,
In this structure, in the hydraulic power side can long lifetime even in harsh and robust operating
be found on the same equipment as in the already shown conditions and compact design.
system , namely MHR rotating the hydraulic motor and Regarding the proportional hydraulic throttle, it
the hydraulic proportional throttle DHP. is a translation spool, piloted without any position
The electronic control board is ECB, structured feedback . Control signals, i1 and i2 must be in the range
around an Arduino development boards type. In contrast 200-800 [mA].

Tp MHR

DHP
A B

uc1 (1) (0) (2) uc2

Y1 Y2
A B I

DI1 Filtru Amp.

DO1 Amplificator 24V,
DI2 RC Op.
0-1A, cu generator PC
DI3 Filtru Amp. de semnal Dither
DO2
RC Op.
AI 1/2/3

Arduino Due
+24VDC
LM78XX +5VDC Kp Ki Kd

BEC

Fig.3 Positioning system

3. Control algorithm
Electronic control block BEC consists of:
- A amplifier dedicated to the proportional To test the developed controller it was necessary
throttle provided on output with two channels between to develop and implement some simple operation
0-800 [mA], it offers the possibility of overlapping algorithms. In their design it was took into account the
control signal Dither signal frequency between 100- fact that the proportion throttle does not allow two
proportional solenoids to be active simultaneously.
250[Hz] hysteresis appears necessary to reduce the They were considered the following algorithms:
proportional electromagnet, the amplifier output signal a) algorithm to control motor direction - this
is about 24 [V], 0-1 [A], on each channel; algorithm is necessary to test the functionality of the
- Due Arduino development board type, with system.
Atmega 328 microcontroller; To do this, set a control voltage on each input
- RC lowpass filter and operational amplifier amplifier , voltage control was arbitrarily chosen mid
acting as double amplitude analogue command voltage range 0 .. 5 [V]. This test proved the functionality of the
proportional electromagnets [7]. mechanical system in both directions of movement. It
- A counter type interface, for incremental was also confirmed the functionality of the transducer.
encoder rotation Tp (TTL digital signals A, B and I); b) simple positioning algorithm - this algorithm
- Voltage analogue interface, for three rotary allows the motor to run after a trapezoidal variation law
of the angular velocity of the motor shaft . This is
potentiometers, respectively the Kp, Ki, Kd. ensured by means of the control voltage (Figure 4).
The controller has been designed to control Motor acceleration - αa , desired operating speed - ur ,
independently the mentioned hydraulic system. as well as motor braking acceleration, uf , and braking
motor speed, αf , can be set by user.

64 The Romanian Review Precision Mechanics, Optics & Mechatronics, 2014, No. 45
 Speed and Position Control for a Hydraulic Rotary Motor

uc1[V] Panta Zona

Viteza lenta si oprire
Viteza regim
accelerare franare
ur

αf t[s]
uf
αa

uc2[V]

uf t[s]

Fig. 4 Motor speed control

Tds

Referinta Eroare
u (t) ɛ (t) + y (t)
+ Kp +
- +

1
Tis+1

Fig. 5 Controlling the angular position

After getting slow speed motion, there is
continued the movement until the target position is
reached. If it passes this position, then it moves in
opposite direction, with slow speed. The algorithm is
repeated until the desired error is obtained.
c) algorithm to control motor speed and direction
after a given (required) law. This procedure is necessary
in order to determine the dynamic characteristics of the
system. The types of signals are on one of the
subsequent shapes: step, ramp, triangular, trapezoidal
and sinusoidal.
d) PID controller for controlling the angular
position of the motor shaft. This type of algorithm
allows, by providing values for gains proportional,
integrative and derivative to achieve in a short time the
target position. The algorithm works in its parallel form
(Figure 5) based on the formula:
1 dε (t )
u (t ) = K p ⋅ ε (t ) +
Ti ∫ ε (t )dt + Td
dt
, It contains the necessary elements for interfacing
with transfer function,
Ki
H ( s ) = Kp + + Kd s ,
s as issues related to the buffer size , the received data is
where Ti and Td is the time integrative constants,
respectively derivatives, ɛ(t) represents the evolution of
the error in time and u(t) is the reference system value
[3] [5] [6].
The adjustment of the positioning system is
operated by changing the parameters Kp , Ki and Kd
with three potentiometers .
These algorithms have been implemented as a
software library.
Programs are stored in the microcontroller's
memory and can run successively, only after
determining in advance, by the user, all specific input
values for each signal type (amplitude , period, phase ,
etc.).
Link to the PC is based on a RS232 bus ( FTDI )
and serves to initiate control and reporting the results.
Microcontroller programming is developed in C + +
environment .
PC programming is developed using a graphic
language, LabVIEW . Chart program designed for
interfacing with the development board is shown in
Figure 6, known as block diagram.
the microcontroller Atmega with the VISA drivers and
for results interpretation received from it. To avoid any
discrepancies that may occur between the time data are
transmitted and respectively data are received , as well
first stored in a text file.
From this point, the data are imported in
LabVIEW, and then saved, in processed order and at
last displayed to the user .

The Romanian Review Precision Mechanics, Optics & Mechatronics, 2014, No. 45 65
 Speed and Position Control for a Hydraulic Rotary Motor

Fig. 6 Labview Block diagram

4. Presenting the experimental model
The experimental results (Fig. 7) were
materialized schematic by sketch shown in Figure 3. In
addition, in this image appears also the pumping group
GP. Equipment used, less rotary hydraulic motor, are
manufactured by FESTO and equipment are for
educational purpose. As already was mentioned, the
motor is manufactured by DANFOS.
In Figure 8 is shown the result of motor shaft
displacement with 500 degrees. It can be seen that the
PID algorithm causes positive overshoot of the unit
around the target position. In figure 9 is presented the
application in LabVIEW front panel, where one can see
the values used to control the system (target position,
Kp, Ki and Kd, etc).

DHP

AEDHP

MHR Tp
φ [o]

500

GP 400

300

200

100

5 10 15 20 25 t [s]
Fig. 7 Experimental setup Fig.8 Motor shaft displacement - 500°

66 The Romanian Review Precision Mechanics, Optics & Mechatronics, 2014, No. 45
 Speed and Position Control for a Hydraulic Rotary Motor

Fig.9 Setting the operating values in Labview front panel

5. Conclusions [3] Preitl Stefan, Precup Radu-Emil, Preitl Zsuzsa

In the developed tests, the system responds
according to the expectations, is it possible to perform
some simple positioning as well as the movement of the
actuator after a predetermined law through algorithms
presented in Section 4.
6. References
[1] Avram M., Duminica D., Udrea C., Gheorghe V.,
Hydronics and Pneutronics - Applications , University
Publishing House , Bucharest, 2008;
[2[ Radoi , R, Theoretical and experimental research on
the optimization of dynamic performance of
electrohydraulic proportional throttles, PH-D Thesis,
Bucharest, 2011;
(2009): Control Structures and Algorithms (in
Romanian Structuri şi algoritmi pentru conducerea
automată a proceselor). Vol. 1, Editura Orizonturi
Universitare Publishers. 272 pp.;
[4] D., Ibrahim , Microcontroller Based Applied Digital
Control, 2006 John Wiley & Sons;
[5] G. P. Liu, S. Daley , Optimal- tuning nonlinear PID
control of hydraulic systems, Control Engineering
Practice, Volume 8 , Issue 9 , September 2000 , Page ,
1045-1053;
[6] Ljubisa Dubonjić, Novak Nedić, Vojislav Filipović ,
Design of PI Controllers for Hydraulic Control Systems,
Mathematical Problems in Engineering, Volume 2013
(2013);
[7] Microchip Application Note 538 - Using PWM to
Generate Analog Output.

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