CONTROL RECONFIGURATION AFTER ACTUATOR FAILURES: THE GENERALISED VIRTUAL ACTUATOR

Abstract Control reconfiguration concerns the problem of finding a new control configuration and new controller parameters after faults have brought the nominal controller out of operation. This paper develops the idea of the generalised virtual actuator, which is a reconfiguration block to be inserted between the faulty plant and the nominal controller. General properties of the reconfigured closed-loop system like the separation principle for the generalised virtual actuator are proved and guidelines are given for the choice of the free parameters. The new reconfiguration scheme includes several ideas that have been recently developed for specific situations and makes it possible to use a uniform reconfiguration algorithm in all these situations. The results are illustrated by presenting a solution to the COSY benchmark problem.