Control of a Flexible Manipulator Using a Sliding Mode Controller with Genetic Algorithm Tuned Manipulator Dimension

The tip position control of a single-link flexible manipulator is considered in this paper. The cross-sectional dimension of the manipulator is tuned by genetic algorithms such that the first vibration mode dominates the higher order vibrations. A sliding mode controller of reduced dimension is employed to control the manipulator using the rigid and vibration measurements as feedback. Control effort is shared dynamically between the rigid mode tracking and vibration suppression. Performance and effectiveness of the proposed reduced dimension sliding mode controller in vibration suppression and against payload variations are demonstrated with simulations.