AUTOMATING PID CONTROLS IN

MATHCAD

Neil Kuyvenhoven
Engr 315
December 11,2002
 AGENDA

Existing / accepted methods

Trial and Error
Zieglar Nichols Method
Cohen – Coon Method
Neil’s Method
Illustrations of Mathcad’s capabilities

AUTOMATING PID CONTROLS IN MATHCAD

 PID Automation
•Three main methods
•Trial and Error Process – Trial and Error

•Zieglar Nichols 1. Set integral / derivative to 0

•Cohen-Coon 2. Increase proportional until sustained
oscillations result – Set proportional to
half of this value
3. Increase integral until sustained
oscillations result – Set Integral to three
times this value
4. Increase derivative until sustained
oscillations result – Set derivative to one
third of this value

AUTOMATING PID CONTROLS IN MATHCAD

 PID Automation
•Three main methods
•Trial and Error
controller p
•Zieglar Nichols output (p)

•Cohen-Coon 0 Time

self
regulating  
system
Process response
(T)
T S = T/ 
Closed Loop
1. With integral and derivative set to 0,
Time
increase proportional until sustained
oscillations result.  t
unstable
2. Apply the period and gain values to the system S = T/t
response
T
Zieglar Nichols closed loop formulae. (T) = not determined

Time

AUTOMATING PID CONTROLS IN MATHCAD

 PID Automation
•Three main methods
•Trial and Error
controller p
•Zieglar Nichols output (p)

•Cohen-Coon 0 Time

self
regulating  
system
Process response
(T)
T S = T/ 
Open Loop
1. Apply the values from the first two figure
Time
to the Cohen-Coon formulae.
2. If the output is similar to the third figure,  t
unstable
use the Zieglar Nichols open loop system S = T/t
response
T
formulae. (T) = not determined

Time

AUTOMATING PID CONTROLS IN MATHCAD

 PID Automation
Method Comparison
Advantages Disadvantages

•Tune to degree of •Time consuming

Trial and
Error satisfaction •Some processes have no ultimate gain.

Zieglar •Single experiment •Open loop – if disturbance introduced

Nichols required during testing, no way of filtering it out.
•Does not need to be •Noisy signals give hard to read data for
stable the slope.
•Settings are easily •Not good for oscillatory open loop
calculated systems

Cohen- •Same as Zieglar Nichols •Result often contains oscillations due to

Coon
the objective ¼ damping ratio
AUTOMATING PID CONTROLS IN MATHCAD
 Neil’s Method

•Set up the Transfer functions

•Convert to time domain
•Solve for the rise time, overshoot, settle time
•Vary controller values based on these values compared to the requirements

Mathcad Example

AUTOMATING PID CONTROLS IN MATHCAD

Neil’s Method

AUTOMATING PID CONTROLS IN MATHCAD

Neil’s Method

AUTOMATING PID CONTROLS IN MATHCAD