Two practical time-optional controllers for rapid slewing of type-3 an
d type-2 third-order plants, PTOS3 and PTOS3tau, respectively, were pr
eviously proposed. In this paper, we present results showing that the
PTOS3tau is more robust than the corresponding time-optimal controller
to both plant parameter variations and flexible unmodeled dynamics. I
n addition, a useful numerical method to calculate the time-optimal co
ntrols for general linear systems is presented. The results for the PT
OS3 and the time-optimal controller for type-3 third-order plants are
similar and thus are not detailed.