APPLICATION OF QFT TO CONTROL-SYSTEM DESIGN - AN OUTLINE FOR ENGINEERS

Control system design is an interdisciplinary and multistage process, and is not a sub-area of mathematics but rather an engineering endeavo ur. It behoves the engineer to reduce the real world control task to a tractable mathematical problem. The required simplifying assumptions and the attendant mathematical modelling effort require sound engineer ing knowledge and judgement. Furthermore, the mathematical solution of the control problem needs to be implemented, and the validity and app licability of the modelling assumptions need to be verified, by the en gineer. Hence, in this paper the process of applying the QFT robust co ntrol system design method is presented from this broad perspective an d it is shown that it is uniquely suited to address and solve engineer ing control system design problems. (C) 1997 by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd .