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PID Controller Based on Flower Pollination Algorithm of Flexible Beam

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Chapter in Lecture Notes in Electrical Engineering · January 2022

DOI: 10.1007/978-981-33-4597-3_17

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PID Controller Based on Flower
Pollination Algorithm of Flexible Beam
System

Ali Akhbar Mohd Fadzli, Muhamad Sukri Hadi, Rickey Ting Pek Eek,
Mat Hussin Ab. Talib, Hanim Mohd Yatim, and Intan Zaurah Mat Darus

Abstract Flexible beam is commonly used in a wide variety of engineering appli-

cations such as mechanical, aircraft and architecture. One of the advantages of these
flexible structures is its lighter as compared to rigid structures. However, flexible
structures are more sensitive to vibration compared to rigid structures. Excessive
long term vibration can damage parts and reduce the performance of such structures.
Therefore, a suitable system should be identified to overcome the problem. In the new
era of technology, there are many methods developed to suppress unwanted vibration.
One well-known system to suppress unwanted vibration is active vibration control
(AVC). This system is suitable for structures experiencing low frequency of vibra-
tion. A proper modelling must be developed using system identification techniques
in order to achieve high vibration cancellation in the system. For system identifica-
tion, evolutionary swarm algorithm is the latest technique used compared to other
methods. In this study, flower pollination algorithms (FPA) was used to develop a
mathematical model of a system. The main objective of this study was to develop a
model for flexible beam system using FPA in order to achieve an approximate model
that represents the real characteristic of the flexible beam system. The developed
model will then be used as a platform for PID controller development. The model
was validated using three robustness methods, which are the mean squared error
(MSE), correlation test, and pole zero diagram stability. Based on the validation, it
was observed that the FPA was able to exhibit the lowest MSE value, very good
correlation test and high stability. The model achieved in this study was used in
controller development for vibration cancellation of a flexible beam system. It was
noticed that the PID controller achieved 17.7 dB of attenuation level at the first mode
of vibration. The attenuation of vibration was reduced from 56.72 to 39.03 dB, which
is equivalent to 31.2% of reduction when the vibration control is active.

A. A. M. Fadzli · M. S. Hadi (B)

Faculty of Mechanical Engineering, Universiti Teknologi MARA, 40450 Shah Alam, Selangor,
Malaysia
e-mail: [email protected]
R. T. P. Eek · M. H. Ab. Talib · H. M. Yatim · I. Z. M. Darus
School of Mechanical Engineering, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia, 81310 Johor, Malaysia

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2022 173
A. F. Ab. Nasir et al. (eds.), Recent Trends in Mechatronics Towards Industry 4.0, Lecture
Notes in Electrical Engineering 730, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-33-4597-3_17
174 A. A. M. Fadzli et al.

Keywords Flexible beam · System identification · Flower pollination algorithm ·

Active vibration control · PID controller

1 Introduction

Flexible beam is one of the parts in a flexible structure. A flexible beam is more
preferable compared to a rigid structure. Since the flexible beam is lighter, it can
reduce the use of material, cost, energy and many more. The characteristic of a flexible
beam can induce unwanted vibration in the system. Vibration can be described as a
repeating motion at a certain period. In some mechanical systems, it is an unwanted
element that exists in the system. Vibration becomes a problem because it can damage
the structure and inhibits the structures’ performance. This problem has garnered
plenty of attention among researchers in means to find a solution to overcome it.
Over the years, there are two methods that are usually used to suppress vibration.
The methods are passive vibration control and AVC [1].
Passive control method is a good technique for simple structures and incendence
of high frequency vibration. However, vibration suppression on flexible beam is more
effective when AVC technique is employed. AVC is more reliable and efficient for
systems which experience low frequency vibration and the parameters can be tuned
until a desired output is attained [2]. Closed-loop feedback system used in AVC
consists of sensors, controllers and actuators while passive vibration control refers to
shock mitigation by passive techniques such as mechanical springs or rubber pads that
are mounted to the object that vibrates. In terms of technology, AVC is more advanced
because it uses electronics in the system which provides accurate results. Based on
the superposition theory, AVC generates a secondary vibration which has a similar
magnitude but in the opposite direction of the unwanted vibration to destructively
interfere it at the desired location. In AVC, it is important to obtain an accurate model
in order to get maximum vibration suppression in the system [3, 4].
System identification is one of the approaches that has been used by researchers to
develop a mathematical model of the system. System identification is a sophisticated
method which uses input and output data in order to develop a mathematical model
that represents a system [5]. Recently, it is a growing trend among researchers to
use swarm intelligence algorithm for identification and implementation of control
system. It consists of a variety of algorithms that were developed by researchers,
including genetic algorithm (GA), particle swarm optimization (PSO), ant colony
system (ACS) and many more [6]. Evolutionary swarm algorithm is a subset of evolu-
tionary computation based on the collective intelligence behavior of self-organized
and decentralized systems or artificial groups of simple agents [7, 8]. The purpose of
this study is to develop a model for flexible beam system using swarm intelligence
algorithm via flower pollination and to control the undesired vibration of the dynamic
system.
PID Controller Based on Flower Pollination … 175

Fig. 1 Experimental setup for flexible beam structure [9]

2 Experimental Setup and Data Collection

Input-output dataset to be used for system identification as acquired via experiments.

In the experiment, a cantilever beam was used as a flexible beam as shown in Fig. 1.
The flexible beam is divided in 20 segments with 21 nodal points. The nodal point
between 9th and 10th is considered as the detection point while nodal point between
19th and 20th is considered as an observation point. Nodal point between 8th and
9th is set as disturbing point in order to get the first dominant mode when exciting.
The input of this system was data at detection point and the output was data at the
observation point. The detection point must be closed to the excitation source while
the observation point at maximum deflection is placed at the end of the beam. From
the experiment, a total of 3334 input and output data were collected [9].

3 Flower Pollination Algorithm

Flower pollination algorithm (FPA) is one of the algorithms that can solve a problem
which was inspired from the pollination process of flowering plants. FPA is a new
metaheuristic intelligent algorithm introduced by British scholar Yang in 2012 [10].
Naturally, flowers reproduce through pollination, while the purpose of flower polli-
nation is to survive. Successful reproduction is dependent on the pollinators. The
advantages of this algorithm is that it has a small number of parameters, very easy
to implement, and has high efficiency [11, 12]. Flower pollination is a process asso-
ciated with transferring flower pollens. The transfer agent are mainly birds, bats,
insect, and others animal. There is a connection between flower and flower polli-
nator which is known as flower-pollinator partnership. Glover in 2014 conducted a
research on the behavior of flower during pollination [12]. FPA has been employed in
176 A. A. M. Fadzli et al.

some applications like parameter identification of DC motor model and compute the
optimal parameters of an unknown infinite impulse response (IIR) system [13, 14].
The pollination behavior can be applied as a mathematical equation which shows
the pattern of global pollination. Pollen and pollinators can travel a long distance
because birds can fly over a long distance. This ensures optimal pollination and
reproduction. The role of global pollination is shown in (1) [14].

x It+1 = xit + L(xit − g∗ ) (1)

where xit the pollen i at iteration t, g* is the best solution found in the current popula-
tion, and L is the Lévy flight step size corresponding to the strength of the pollination.
Lévy distribution can be given by (2).
 πλ 
λΓ (λ) sin 1
L∼ 2
, (s  s0 > 0) (2)
π s 1+λ
here (λ) is the standard gamma function, and s is the step size. The local pollination
takes place when the random number is lesser than the switch probability p which is
represented by (3).
 
xit+1 = xit + ∈ x tj − xkt (3)

In the above equation, x tj and xkt are the pollen from different flowers of the same
type. It equivalently became a local random walk if ∈ is drawn from a uniform
distribution [0, 1]. Figure 2 shows the flowchart of FPA.

4 Active Vibration Control

Based on superposition theory, AVC technique uses a secondary vibration response

which has a similar magnitude but in the opposite direction with the flexible struc-
ture system in order to suppress the vibration. The simulation of AVC is conducted
using MATLAB/Simulink R2018a software. Proportional-Integral-Derivative (PID)
controller is developed to simulate vibration suppression of flexible beam. The PID
controller parameter is tuned by using heuristic method until it effectively suppresses
the vibration at first mode of vibration of the system. Figure 3 shows the block diagram
of AVC based controller developed in MATLAB/Simulink software.

5 Result and Discussion

FPA was applied to obtain an approximate model of the flexible beam system. There
are 3334 data from the experiment was used to develop a mathematical of flexible
PID Controller Based on Flower Pollination … 177

Fig. 2 Flower pollination algorithm flowchart

178 A. A. M. Fadzli et al.

Fig. 3 Block diagram of PID controller in MATLAB/Simulink environment

beam model. 3334 experimental data were divided into two parts which are 1666
data for training and 1668 data for testing. The developed model was then validated
using three criteria in order to select the best model of the system. In this study, the
best model was chosen based on the lowest MSE value, achieving 95% confidence
level of correlation test and has high stability.

5.1 Modelling Using Flower Pollination Algorithm (FPA)

The best model employing FPA) was obtained by properly tuning five parameters
in the algorithm which are model order, switch probability, maximum generation,
population size, lower and upper boundary using heuristic method. The process of
tuning parameter was made by adjusting one parameter at a time and the other
parameters were fixed. Initially, the population size was tuned between the range
of 10 to 25. Then, the switch probability was tuned from 0.5 until 1.0, where 1 is
the maximum limit of switch probability. According to the previous study, 0.8 is the
best switch probability value for most applications [15]. Next, the value of lower
boundary and upper boundary was set from 1 till 10. Basically, lower and upper
boundaries have the same magnitude value but different integer. This means that the
lower boundary value is in negative integer while the upper boundary is in positive
integer. After that, the maximum generation value was tuned from 500 until 2500
with an increment of 500 for each tuning. The number of maximum generations were
tuned to 2500 only till the result obtained no longer changes. Lastly, the parameter
of developed model was tuned from 1 until 10. Table 1 presents the set of parameters
used to achieve the best model for the system.
Based on the set of parameters used in Table 1, the lowest MSE achieved in FPA
algorithm are 1.2549 × 10−06 and 5.3544 × 10−09 in training and testing data, respec-
tively. The best model order was achieved in order 3 of the system. The convergence
curve of FPA modelling as shown in Fig. 4. Figure 5 presents the actual and predicted
PID Controller Based on Flower Pollination … 179

Table 1 The set of

No. Parameter Value
parameters used for FPA
algorithm 1. Maximum generation 2500
2. Switch probability 0.8
3. Population size 25
4. Upper boundary −10
5. Lower boundary 10
6. Model order 3
7. Number of parameters 6

Fig. 4 The convergence curve of FPA modelling

Vibration Experimental Output vs Natural Frequencies of first two modes

Estimated Output of vibration (dB)
40
1 Actual Actual
Normalized Magnitude (dB)

Flower Pollination
30 X: 2.279 Flower Pollination
X: 12.86
Y: 34.6
Normalized Deflection

Y: 31.69
0.5 20

10
0 0

-10
-0.5
Training data Testing data -20

-1 -30

-40
0 500 1000 1500 2000 2500 3000 0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16 18 20
Time(samples) Frequency (Hz)
(a) (b)

Fig. 5 Actual and prediction outputs of FPA modelling: a Time domain, b frequency domain
180 A. A. M. Fadzli et al.

outputs of the system in time and frequency domains, respectively. Here, it can be
observed that the developed system imitated the actual characteristic of flexible beam
structure very well. Figure 6 shows the error between actual and estimated outputs of
the system in FPA modeling. The robustness of the developed model was validated
using pole zero diagram stability and correlation test as shown in Figs. 7 and 8,
respectively. Figure 7 shows the pole zero diagram stability. It was indicated that the
system has high stability since all the poles of the transfer function are within the unit
circle. Figure 8 presents the correlation tests of FPA modeling. It can be seen that
the system has a good correlation between input and error where the graph shows
the system was unbiased and yields within 95% confidence interval. The discrete
transfer function obtained using FPA modelling is described as (4):

Fig. 6 Error between actual 10-3

and prediction outputs of 5
FPA modelling Error
Error

Training data Testing data

-5
0 500 1000 1500 2000 2500 3000
Time(samples)

Fig. 7 Pole zero diagram 1

stability of FPA modelling
0.8

0.6

0.4
Imaginary Part

0.2

-0.2

-0.4

-0.6

-0.8

-1
-1 -0.5 0 0.5 1
Real Part
PID Controller Based on Flower Pollination … 181

Auto correlation of residual Cross correlation of the input-residual

1 1

0.8 0.8

0.6 0.6

0.4 0.4

0.2 0.2

0 0

-0.2 -0.2
-0.4 -0.4
-0.6 -0.6
-0.8 -0.8
-1 -1
-100 -80 -60 -40 -20 0 20 40 60 80 100 -100 -80 -60 -40 -20 0 20 40 60 80 100
lag lag
(a) (b)

Fig. 8 Correlation tests of FPA modelling: a Auto correlation, b cross correlation

0.01298 z−1 − 0.02299z−2 +0.01083z−3

(4)
1 − 2.921z−1 + 2.885z−2 − 0.963z−3

5.2 PID Controller Tuned by Heuristic Method

The parameters of PID controller are obtained using heuristic method where it was
based on a trial and error estimation. The proportional gain, K p , integral gain, K i
and derivative gain, K d are tuned till a high attenuation at first mode of vibration on
flexible beam system was achieved. The simulation of PID controller is conducted
by introducing sinusoidal disturbances in the system. The PID parameters used in
this study are 1.38, 1.9785 and 0.494625 for K p , K i and K d , respectively. Table 2
elucidates the attenuation level achieved by PID controller using heuristic method
with sinusoidal disturbance in the system. Figure 9 presents the vibration suppression
of the flexible beam system in time and frequency domains, respectively. It was
noticed that the controller successfully achieved 17.7 dB of attenuation level in the

Table 2 The attenuation

Controller Decibel Attenuation Percentage of
level achieved by PID
magnitude level (dB) reduction
controller based on FPA
(dB)
algorithm
1st mode 1st mode 1st mode
Without PID 56.72 Reference Reference
controller
With PID 39.03 17.7 31.2%
controller
182 A. A. M. Fadzli et al.

60
X: 794 Without PID controller
1 Y: 0.8213 X: 2.36 With PID controller
50
Y: 56.72

40
0.5
Acceleration(m/s2)

X: 2.36

Magnitude (dB)
X: 794
Y: 0.1011
30 Y: 39.03

0 20

10
-0.5
0

-10
-1 Without PID controller With PID controller

-20
0 200 400 600 800 1000 1200 1400 1600 0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16 18 20
Time(seconds) Frequency (Hz)

(a) (b)
Fig. 9 PID controller based on FPA: a Time domain, b frequency domain

system. The attenuation of vibration is reduced from 56.72 to 39.03 dB, which is
equivalent to 31.2% of reduction. Based on the result, the developed PID controller
was successful in suppressing undesired vibration experienced by the system in a
simulation environment.

6 Conclusion

The modelling of flexible beam using FPA was conducted in this study. The model
was validated to determine its effectiveness in a system using MSE, correlation test
and pole zero stability. The developed model successfully achieved the lowest MSE
value, good correlation between input and error, and to be found within 95% confi-
dence level with high stability. Then, the development of an AVC was successfully
carried out for vibration suppression of a flexible beam system. The PID controller
was selected because of its simplicity and robustness. It was indicated that the
controller developed achieved good attenuation level at the first mode of vibration
in the system. The controller achieved 31.2% reduction of unwanted vibration in the
dominant mode of the flexible beam system.

Acknowledgements The authors would like to express their gratitude to Universiti Teknologi
MARA (UiTM), Universiti Teknologi Malaysia (UTM) and Ministry of Higher Education (MoHE)
for funding the research and providing facilities to conduct this research. Sponsor file number
(RACER/1/2019/TK03/UITM//1).
 PID Controller Based on Flower Pollination … 183

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