Reduced order model and robust control architecture for mechanical systemswith nonholonomic Pfaffian constraints

The position/force control of mechanical systems subject to a set of Pfaffi an constraints is addressed in this paper. A reduced order dynamical descri ption of such nonholonomic mechanical systems, including the constraints, i s developed. Some properties of the dynamic model are then exploited to fac ilitate the controller design. Based on theory of guaranteed stability of u ncertain systems, a robust control algorithms is derived, guaranteeing the uniform ultimate boundedness of the tracking errors. A detailed numerical e xample is presented to illustrate the developed method.