Sensors and Control Systems

Lecture Topic 7
Proportional, Derivative, and Integral Feedback
1 Introduction
In previous lectures, we have seen how to develop a transfer function to describe the dynamic behaviour of a
system and how first- and second-order systems will respond to some commonly-used input signals. In this
lecture we look at how the behaviour of such systems can be modified and controlled by the introduction of
various forms of feedback.
As before, these notes build upon discussion and data from the course text "Essentials of Control" by
J.Schwarzenbach, to which you referred for more details.
Throughout these notes this symbol has been used to mark points at which you should try to verify the
results given or answer the questions asked in your own time or during tutorials.

2 Simple Proportional Feedback

A common technique in control systems is for the input signal to represent a desired level of output from the
system. For example, an input voltage signal could be used to indicate the desired position for a position
control system. The position could then be measured with a potentiometer and converted back into a voltage.
The control objective is that the position should change until the voltage output from the potentiometer is
equal to the input signal. In other words, the position should change until the difference between the input
signal and the output from the sensor (the error) is zero.
Consider the following block diagram of the position control system:

Vi(s)

Ve(s)

Vo(s)

G(s)

o(s)

H(s)

Here o(s) represents the angular position of the shaft and Vi(s) represents the input signal. The error signal,
Ve(s), is found by subtracting the output from the sensor, Vo(s), from Vi(s).
G(s) is the transfer function for our motor and H(s) is the transfer function for the sensor.
From a control point of view, it would be useful to know how o(s) depends on Vi(s). In other words, we need
to know the transfer function of the whole system, including the feedback. From our block diagram, we can
observe the following relationships:

Vi ( s ) = Ve ( s ) + Vo ( s )
Vo ( s ) = H ( s ) o ( s )

o ( s) = G ( s )Ve ( s )
Page 1 of 10

David Lee, Nov 2004

We can then derive the transfer function of our closed-loop system as follows:

C ( s) =

o ( s)
Vi ( s )

G ( s )Ve ( s )
Ve ( s ) + Vo ( s )

G ( s )Ve ( s )
Ve ( s ) + G ( s ) H ( s )Ve ( s )

G ( s)
1 + G ( s) H ( s)

This is an important result that is used any time we need to know the transfer function of a closed-loop system.
To see how this system behaves, lets simplify things and assume that the back-EMF can be neglected1 and
that the majority of our motor constants have been chosen to have unit values so that

G(s) =

1
s( s + K f )

where K f is the viscous friction constant of the motor ( check for yourself that this is the correct general
form for this transfer function). We also assume that our angular position sensor has been designed so that

H (s) = 1
Now we have that:

C ( s) =

o ( s)
Vi ( s )

G(s)
1 + G ( s)

1
s( s + K f )
=
1
1+
s(s + K f )
=

1
s(s + K f ) + 1

1
s + K f s +1
2

We can now compare this to the standard form for second-order transfer function and deduce ( make sure
you that can do this) that:

K =1
n = 1

Kf
2

This is an oversimplification since a motor with no back-EMF would not generate any torque. If however, we assumed a
value of 1 for Kb, the results presented here would still apply, but with Kf replaced by Kf+1. This would unnecessarily
complicate the algebra in this introduction.

Page 2 of 10

David Lee, Nov 2004

So our system with feedback has a steady-state gain of 1 and a damping ratio of

Kf
2

. The unit steady-state

gain tells us that, if we input a step function for Vi(s), the system would settle into a steady state where
o(s)=Vi(s). In other words, there would be no steady-state error.
The damping ratio tells us that the system is critically damped if K f = 2 , underdamped for smaller values of

K f , and overdamped for larger values.

We can also consider the time constant of an underdamped system. If we call this value , it can be shown
that

2
Kf

So, as K f decreases, the system becomes less and less damped, and the time constant (and hence the settling
time) increases.

3 Proportional Gain
The input to our controlled system (the motor) was, in the previous case, simply the error signal. It is tempting
to think that we might get better results if we amplified the error to create the input for our motor. Maybe it
would then get to the desired position more quickly. So we could try to insert a proportional gain into our
control loop as shown in the following Simulink system.

The input to the motor is now simply K P times the error signal. The combined transfer function of the
amplifier and the motor is now K p G ( s ) or

KP
. Repeating our previous analysis, we now obtain (
s( s + K f )

check) the following transfer function for the closed loop system:

C ( s) =

KP
s + K f s + KP
2

Again, comparing to the standard form of the second-order system gives us:

K =1

n = K p
=

Page 3 of 10

Kf
2 KP
David Lee, Nov 2004

We can also calculate the time constant for an underdamped system:

2
Kf

So we can now see that increasing the gain causes a decrease in the damping ratio and an increase in the
undamped natural frequency. Consider the following two plots. In both cases K f is set to 2, and the values for

K P are 10 and 40 respectively.

Notice that the rate of oscillation is higher for the higher value of gain, but that we have not achieved our
objective of getting to the steady-state value more quickly. The time constant in these two plots is the same, as
we would expect from our previous observation that is independent of the gain, and depends only on K f .
So, increasing the proportional gain does not seem to have helped us much (although, as we will see later, in
can help in many applications to reduce steady-state error). We must therefore look for other ways to improve
the behaviour of our system.

4 Derivative Feedback
We showed in Section 2 that we could increase the damping of a system by increasing the coefficient of
viscous friction K f . The drawback would, of course, be that, by increasing the viscous friction in our motor,
we would be increasing the amount of wasted energy.
An alternative (and energy-efficient) way to decrease the amount of oscillation in our control system is by
taking into account not just the value of the error but also the rate of change of the error. For example, if the
output of our system is too low (positive error) and getting even lower (positive rate of change of error) we
need an especially large increase in the control input. On the other hand, if the output of the system is too low
(positive error) but increasing (negative rate of change of error) a much smaller increase in the control input
would be needed. These observations (and similar ones for the other combinations of positive and negative
values) suggest that we could use a multiple of the rate of change of error as another input to our controller.
This is known as including a derivative term in our controller. The derivative term effectively acts as a
predictor of system behaviour.

Page 4 of 10

David Lee, Nov 2004

The following controller includes a proportional term and a derivative term, and is known as a "PD" controller.

Mathematically, we can describe the transfer function of the controller as:

KP + KDs
(Don't forget that taking the derivative of a function is equivalent to multiplying the function's Laplace
transform by s.)
The open-loop transfer function of the PD controller and the motor is then given by:

KP + KDs
s(s + K f )
The closed-loop transfer function is then:

KP + KDs
s(s + K f )
C (s) =
K + KDs
1+ P
s( s + K f )
=

KP + KDs
s(s + K f ) + K P + K D s

KP + KDs
s + ( K f + K D )s + K P
2

If we compare the denominator of this transfer function with the standard form, we can see ( check) that:

n = K p
=

(K f + K D )
2 KP

So the addition of the derivative term has had the same effect as increasing the amount of viscous friction.
The effectiveness of the derivative term can be seen in the following plot in which, as in the second plot in
Section 3, K f is 2 and K P is 40. We have, however, also added a derivative term with K D set to 10. In
comparison with the plot in Section 2, we can see that the system converges much more rapidly to the steadystate value with no overshoot.
Page 5 of 10

David Lee, Nov 2004

Working out the steady state gain is not quite so straightforward as before, because the numerator is not in the
standard form. We could, however consider applying a step input to the system and then using the final value
theorem to deduce the steady-state value. In practice, this is equivalent to working out the value of our transfer
function as s 0 . ( Why?) Using this method, we can see that the steady-state gain of this system is 1, as
shown on the above plot.

5 Steady-State Error
The position-control system that we have been using for our example in these lectures so far has been
simplified by the fact that it has had no load to overcome. We are now going to change the system slightly and
add a load so that the torque generated by the load is proportional to the angle of rotation. (This could arise in
practice if the motor was attached to a torsional spring or a shaft that it was trying to twist.) In such a system,
the motor must continue to apply some torque to keep the shaft in a desired position.
If we continue to assume that back-EMF can be neglected and all of our motor constants except viscous
friction have unit value, we now have:

V ( s ) = s 2 ( s) + sK f ( s) + k ( s)
where k is the stiffness of the spring. This then gives us the following open-loop transfer function:

G ( s) =

V ( s)
1
= 2
( s) s + K f s + k

The closed-loop transfer function with proportional feedback only is then:

KP
s +Kfs+k
C ( s) =
KP
1+ 2
s +Kfs+k
2

KP
s + K f s + (K P + k )
2

If we use the same method that we used in Section 4 to work out the steady-state gain of this system, by letting
s 0 , we find that the steady-state gain of this system is

KP
KP + k
Page 6 of 10

David Lee, Nov 2004

So we can see that, for k>0 , the steady-state gain is always going to be less than one. This means that the
output of our system (the position of the motor shaft) is going to be less than the target value, giving a steadystate error.

These two plots show the response of the system to a unit step input. They show that we can decrease the
steady-state error by increasing the gain, but at the expense of increased overshoot and oscillation. There will
also be practical limits to how high a gain we can use without, for example, saturating amplifiers. From our
previous discussion we can see that introducing a derivative term in the controller may help to increase the
damping of the system, but it will not decrease the steady-state error. We need an alternative way to eliminate
the steady-state error.

6 Integral Feedback
The plot on the left below shows the error in the system. We can see that the system has settled into a steadystate error of about 0.1. On the right we can see the effect of integrating that error. As long as the steady-state
error persists, the integral of error is increasing. This may give us a signal that we can use in our controller to
eliminate the steady-state error.

Page 7 of 10

David Lee, Nov 2004

We therefore add an integral term to our controller as shown below:

The effect of the integral term can be seen in the following output. The system has now settled with no steadystate error.

We do, however, have to take care not to have too much integral input to our controller. As the following plot
shows, too high a value for KI can decrease the damping in the system, leading to more overshoot and
oscillation.

Page 8 of 10

David Lee, Nov 2004

To show the effect of the integral term mathematically, we represent the transfer function of the PI controller
as:

KP +

KI
s

(Don't forget that, just as differentiation is expressed by multiplying the Laplace transform by s, integration the inverse - is expressed by dividing by s.) The closed-loop transfer function of our system now becomes:

KI
s
2
s +Kfs+k
C ( s) =
K
KP + I
s
1+ 2
s +Kfs+k
KP +

KPs + KI
s s + K f s + (K P + k ) + K I

If, as before, we determine the steady-state gain by setting s equal to zero, we find that the steady-state gain is
K I K I = 1 , giving us no steady-state error.

Page 9 of 10

David Lee, Nov 2004

7 PID Controllers
Having looked at the effects of proportional, derivative, and integral error feedback, we can now summarise
our conclusions:

Proportional feedback can be used to ensure that the system converges to a steady-state value. High
levels of proportional feedback will decrease the steady-state error, but decrease the damping ratio of
the closed-loop system, causing more overshoot and faster oscillation.

Derivative feedback increases the damping of the system by using the rate of change of error to predict
the behaviour of the system error.

Integral feedback eliminates steady-state error. Too high a level of integral feedback can decrease the
damping of the system.

Controllers often use all three types of feedback, and are known as PID controllers. Here is an example of such
a controller in Simulink.

This is an example of the output of this PID controller. The gains were chosen by trial and error. There are,
however, more structured techniques for tuning PID controllers, one of the most common of which was
devised by Ziegler and Nichols.

Page 10 of 10

David Lee, Nov 2004