Procedure of Drawing the Asymptotic Bode Plots

1. Put the transfer function into a standard factorized form with the constant term as a unit number
(i.e. 1) and find the right gain K:
𝑄
𝐾∏ (1+𝜏 𝑠) ∏𝑃 (1+2𝜁𝑙 𝑠⁄𝜔𝑛𝑙 +𝑠2 ⁄𝜔𝑛𝑙
2
)
𝐺(𝑠) = 𝑠𝑁 ∏𝑀𝑖=1(1+𝜏 𝑖 𝑠) ∏𝑙=1
𝑅 2 ⁄𝜔2 )
𝑚=1 𝑚 𝑘=1(1+2𝜁𝑘 𝑠⁄𝜔𝑛𝑘 +𝑠 𝑛𝑘

25(𝑠+2) 25∗2(𝑠⁄2+1)
For example, 𝐺(𝑠) = (𝑠+5)
should be put in the standard form as: 𝐺(𝑠) = 5(𝑠⁄5+1)
=
10(𝑠⁄2+1)
(𝑠⁄5+1)
, and the gain should be K=10.

2. Four typical kinds of factors may occur in the standard form:

1. Constant K,
2. Poles (zeros) at the origin (1/s, or s)
3. Poles (or zeros) on the real axis ( 1⁄(1 + 𝜏𝑚 𝑠) , 𝑜𝑟 (1 + 𝜏𝑖 𝑠)).
2
4.Complex conjugate poles (or zeros) ( 1⁄(1 + 2𝜁𝑘 𝑠⁄𝜔𝑛𝑘 + 𝑠 2 ⁄𝜔𝑛𝑘 ),
2 2
or (1 + 2𝜁𝑙 𝑠⁄𝜔𝑛𝑙 + 𝑠 ⁄𝜔𝑛𝑙 ))

3. For each factor, carry out the analysis on both magnitude and phases’ change with input
frequency ω by substituting 𝑠 = 𝑗𝜔 to the transfer function and following the definitions of
logarithmic magnitude and angle (i.e. phase) of 𝐺(𝑗𝜔).

4. Define the coordinates on both magnitude and phase semi-log plots and the starting frequency
on 𝑙𝑜𝑔𝜔 axis should be the one (fold of 10) close to the lowest frequency found in Step 3.

10(𝑠⁄2+1)
For 𝐺(𝑠) = (𝑠⁄5+1)
, the lowest frequency is 0.2rad/s in the phase analysis of (s/2+1). Hence
the starting frequency should be 0.1rad/s

5. On both magnitude and phase plots, draw the asymptotic plots (i.e. segments of straight lines) for
each factored term based on the analysis results in Step 3 and indicate the slope for each segment
line.

6. Plot the overall asymptotic magnitude and phase plots by adding all segments lines from the
starting frequency to the highest frequency of 𝑙𝑜𝑔𝜔 axis, i.e. finding the segment line with right
slope (i.e. the summation of the slopes) between the key frequencies ranges identified in Step3.