A SUPERVISOR FOR CONTROL OF MODE-SWITCH PROCESSES

Many processes operate only around a limited number of operation point s. In order to have adequate control around each operation point, an a daptive controller could be used. When the operation point changes oft en, a large number of parameters would have to be adapted over and ove r again. This makes application of conventional adaptive control unatt ractive, which is more suited for processes with slowly changing param eters. Furthermore, continuous adaptation is not always needed or desi red. An extension of adaptive control is presented, in which for each operation point the process behaviour can be stored in a memory, retri eved from it and evaluated. These functions are co-ordinated by a ''su pervisor''. This concept is referred to as a supervisor for control of mode-switch processes. It leads to an adaptive control structure whic h quickly adjusts the controller parameters based on retrieval of old information, without the need to fully relearn each time. This approac h has been tested on experimental set-ups of a flexible beam and of a flexible two-link robot arm, but it is directly applicable to other pr ocesses, for instance, in the (petro) chemical industry.