• Journal of Drive and Control
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• v.18 no.2
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• pp.46-55
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• 2021

A forklift is a powered industrial vehicle used to lift and move materials over short distances. Nowadays, almost all forklifts are equipped with an automatic transmission due to its improved operator comfort and increased productivity. Thanks to marked improvement of transmission control unit equipped with highly-advanced microcontrollers, recently developed automatic transmission for forklift have various auxiliary functions such as creep, auto retardation, and automatic shift with excellent shift quality. This paper deals with the creep function which enables one to maneuver a forklift at the designated low speed by slip control of clutches. The design of creep function was based on four modes of creep operation depending on the status of the operator's shift lever and accelerator pedal. Control algorithms and control parameters for each mode were designed to achieve the desired static and dynamic performance. Vehicle test for the designed creep function was carried out with an independently developed embedded controller. Test results confirmed good creep speed control without speed error at a steady state with a mild shift shock during mode changes by stepping or releasing the accelerator.

• Smart Structures and Systems
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• v.29 no.4
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• pp.577-588
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• 2022

Oil refineries' Fluid Catalytic Cracking Units (FCCU) when in full operation may exhibit strong fluid dynamics caused by turbulent flow in the piping system that may induce vibrations in other mechanical and structural components of the Unity. This paper reports on the experimental-theoretical-computational program performed to get the vibration properties and the dynamic response amplitudes to find out alternative solutions to attenuate the excessive vibrations that were causing fatigue fractures in components of the bottle like reactor-regenerator of an FCC unit in operation in an existing oil refinery in Brazil. Solutions to the vibration problem were sought with the aid of a 3D finite element model calibrated with the results obtained from experimental measurements. A short description of the found solutions is given and their effectiveness are shown by means of numerical results. The solutions were guided by the concepts of structural stiffening and dynamic control performed by a nonlinear pendulum controller whose mechanical design was based on parameters determined by means of a parametric study carried out with 2D and 3D mathematical models of the coupled pendulum-structure system. The effectiveness of the proposed solutions is evaluated in terms of the fatigue life of critical welded connections.

• Journal of Auto-vehicle Safety Association
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• v.14 no.2
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• pp.7-13
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• 2022

This paper presents a yaw moment control based on estimated mass for manual-shift commercial vehicles. In yaw moment controller, parameter uncertantiy of vehicle mass is important because the desired yaw moment depends on vehicle parameter. However, in the case of commercial vehicle, the weight of the loaded vehicle is more than twice as much as compared to the unloaded vehicle. The proposed algorithm estimates the vehicle mass by using the longitudinal dynamic and gear shifting characteristics. The estimated mass is used to adaptively modify the vehicle parameters. In addition, this paper estimates the chamber pressure of a pneumatic brake and generates the target yaw moment through on/off valve control. MATLAB/Simulink and Trucksim were performed under sine with dwell test. The results demonstrate that the proposed algorithm improves the lateral and rollover stability.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Precision Engineering
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• v.14 no.1
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• pp.174-184
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• 1997

This paper presents a robust force tracking control of a smart flexible gripper featured by a piezoceramic actuator characterizing its durability and quick response time. A mathematical governing equation for the proposed gripper structure is derived by employing Hamilton's principle and a state space control model is subsequently obtained through model analysis. Uncertain system parameters such as frequency variation are included in the control model. A sliding mode control theory which has inherent robustness to the sys- tem uncertainties is adopted to design a force tracking controller for the piezoceramic actuator. Using out- put information from the tip force sensor, a full-order observer is constructed to estimate state variables of the system. Force tracking performances for desired trajectories represented by sinusoidal and step func- tions are evaluated by undertaking both simulation and experimental works. In addition, in order to illustrate practical feasibility of the proposed method, a two-fingered gripper is constructed and its performance is demonstrated by showing a capability of holding an object.

• Journal of Institute of Control, Robotics and Systems
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• v.7 no.7
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• pp.559-566
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• 2001

The sway control problem of the pendulum motion of a container hanging on the trolly, which transports containers from a container ship to trucks, is considered in the paper. In the container crane control problem, suppressing the residual swing motion of the container at the end of acceleration, deceleration or the case of that the unexpected disturbance input exists is main issue. For this problem, in general, the trolley motion control strategy is introduced and applied. In this paper, we introduce and synthesize a new type of swing motion control system in which a small auxiliary mass is installed on the spreader. The actuator reacting against the auxiliary mall applies inertial control forces to the container to reduce the swing motion in the desired manner. In this paper, we apply the $H^{\infty}$ based gain-scheduling control technique to the anti-swing motion control system design problem of the controlled plant. In this control system, the controller dynamics are adjusted in real-time according to time-varying plant parameters. And the simulation result shows that the proposed control strategy is shown to be useful for the case of time-varying system and, robust to disturbances such as winds and initial sway motion.

• The Journal of Korea Robotics Society
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• v.19 no.2
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• pp.149-158
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• 2024

This paper presents a robust autonomous navigation and reconnaissance system for tracked robots, designed to handle complex multi-floor indoor environments with stairs. We introduce a localization algorithm that adjusts scan matching parameters to robustly estimate positions and create maps in environments with scarce features, such as narrow rooms and staircases. Our system also features a path planning algorithm that calculates distance costs from surrounding obstacles, integrated with a specialized PID controller tuned to the robot's differential kinematics for collision-free navigation in confined spaces. The perception module leverages multi-image fusion and camera-LiDAR fusion to accurately detect and map the 3D positions of objects around the robot in real time. Through practical tests in real settings, we have verified that our system performs reliably. Based on this reliability, we expect that our research team's autonomous reconnaissance system will be practically utilized in actual disaster situations and environments that are difficult for humans to access, thereby making a significant contribution.

• Smart Structures and Systems
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• v.34 no.2
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• pp.73-85
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• 2024

Smart base-isolated buildings rest on flexible pads known as base isolators that minimize the effect of external disturbances along with active/semi-active actuators. The strategies used to control these active components are typically based on system models that are known a priori. Although these models describe some of the most important dynamics of the elements involved in the system, the high degree of uncertainty in the behavior of a structure under external disturbances is very difficult to characterize using a fixed model. In this work, we propose a strategy that deals with this issue: the input that controls the actuator in the base isolation system results from the compound action of a controller that relies on a model of the system that is known a priori, and a control policy that is designed based on online data-driven inferences on the behavior of the system. In this way, the control design process incorporates both the prior information about the system and the unknowns of the system, such as non-modeled parameters and nonlinear behaviors in the building. We show through simulations the performance of the proposed method in an eight-story building subjected to seismic loading.

• Smart Structures and Systems
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• v.33 no.6
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• pp.415-430
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• 2024

To control vertical and lateral compound vibration simultaneously using an integrated smart controller, passive tuned mass damper (TMD) and tuned liquid damper (TLD) are updated and combined to an adaptive-passive TMD-TLD (AP-TMD-TLD) system. As for the vertical AP-TMD part on top of the vertical spring, it can retune itself through varying the level of liquid in the tank to adjust its mass, while the lateral AP-TLD part at the bottom of the vertical spring can retune itself by changing the level of liquid. Further, for multimodal response control, the multiple AP-TMD-TLD (MAP-TMD-TLD) system is proposed as well. Each AP-TMD-TLD in the system can identify the structural vertical and lateral modal frequencies through the wavelet-transform (WT) based algorithm and retune its vertical and lateral natural frequencies both through adjusting the level of liquid in the AP-TMD and AP-TLD parts respectively. A cantilever cable-stayed landscape bridge which is sensitive to both human-induced and wind-induced vibrations is presented as a case study. For comparison, initial parameters of MAP-TMD-TLD are mistuned. Results show that the presented system can retune its vertical and lateral frequencies precisely, while the retuned system has a better bi-directional compound control effect than the mistuned system before the retuning operation and can improve the serviceability significantly.

• Archives of design research
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• v.20 no.3 s.71
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• pp.119-128
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• 2007

With the development of digital technologies, CAID became an essential part in the industrial design process. Creating photo-realistic images from a virtual scene with 3D models is one of the specialized task for CAID users. This task requires a complex interface of setting the positions and the parameters of camera and lights for optimal rendering results. However, the user interface of existing CAID tools are not simple for designers because the task is mostly accomplished in a parameter setting dialogue window. This research address this interface issues, in particular the issues related to lighting, by developing and evaluating TLS(Tangible Lighting Studio) that uses Augmented Reality and Tangible User Interface. The interface of positioning objects and setting parameters become tangible and distributed in the workspace to support more intuitive rendering task. TLS consists of markers, and physical controller, and a see-through HMD(Head Mounted Display). The user can directly control the lighting parameters in the AR workspace. In the evaluation experiment, TLS provide higher effectiveness, efficiency and user satisfaction compared to existing GUI(Graphic User Interface) method. It is expected that the application of TLS can be expanded to photography education and architecture simulation.

• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
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• v.18 no.3
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• pp.232-241
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• 2017

This paper presents an automated cow-feeding system based on an AGV and screw conveyor for domestic livestock farms, which are becoming larger and more commercialized. The system includes a hopper module for loading pellet-type mixed feed at the top of the system, a transfer module mounted with a screw conveyor to transfer feed from the hopper module to the outlet module, an outlet module composed of belt conveyors, and an electromagnetic guided driving-type AGV. The weight of the loaded feed is measured by a load cell located under the transfer module. The system reads the feed discharge information stored in RFID tags installed in each cowshed cell, and a predetermined amount of feed is discharged while the AGV is moving. A cow-feed test system was constructed to determine the design parameters of the screw conveyor in the transfer module that determine the feeding capacity. These parameters include the screw's outer diameter, the screw shaft outer diameter, and screw pitch. The parameters were applied to the finalized cow-feed system construction. A DSP-based main controller and cow-feeding algorithm for different scenarios were also developed to control the system. Experimental results confirmed that the system could supply a total of 21 kg of feed uniformly at 420 g/s for a cowshed cell which has 7 cows. The driving distance was 5 m and the speed was 0.1 m/s. Thus, the proposed system could be applied to standardized domestic livestock farms.