Active vibration control of a blade element with uncertainty modeling in PZT actuator force

The aim of this research is to attenuate the vibrations of a blade structure with an attached piezoelectric actuator using robust multi-objective control. The force obtained from a piezoelectric patch loading has uncertainties due to the complicated shape (airfoil) of the blade element. A parameter-dependent model of the force equation is developed to understand the possible variation range of the actuation force. The modal analysis of the blade is performed to find vibration mode frequencies, and an aerodynamic load is generated experimentally to create steady-state vibration on the blade. A state-space model is obtained by considering certain vibration modes and the parameter-dependent part of the force in the input vector is taken outside of the plant model. The robust stability filter is modified with parameter dependency to have a cluster of the filter. Two different multi-objective controllers are designed with different design objectives. The designed controllers are implemented in experiments and performances of the controllers are compared using frequency and time domain responses. It is shown that the flexible blade vibrations are successfully suppressed with the proposed mixed norm robust controllers under the effect of steady-state aerodynamic disturbance with different air speeds. It is observed in experimental results that the performances of the H∞/H2 controller are better than the H2/H∞ controller.