As a new control technique called the subspace control method is developed in an effort to carry out finely tuned control easily and efficiently for a complicated and large-scale mechanical system. In the subspace control method, the minimum and optimum subspace suited for the control specification is extracted from the entire state space by applying the concept of modal analysis, and feedback control based on the modal coordinate is performed in the subspace. The subspace control method takes advantage of the dynamic characteristics of the controlled object in the design of control system. In addition, decreasing the dimension of the controlled object based on the dynamic characteristics leads to simplification of the design of control system, reduction of mechanical overload caused by the control, and a reduction in consumed electric power. In the present study, in order to clarify the fundamental concept, the subspace control method is formulated for swing-up and stabilizing controls of an inverted pendulum system. The effectiveness of the proposed method is verified by numerical simulations and experiments.
