Abstract

Flexible manipulators can be characterized by a dynamic model with a large number of vibration modes. The use of such a model in the model-based control schemes requires reduction of model order. In this paper, we present a method of reducing the order of a marginally stable system based on the fact that translation transformations in the frequency domain preserve the input-output properties of the system. We address the successful application of the method to model reduction of a flexible manipulator. The method is also applicable for any other marginally stable model, such as elastic space trusswork and multi-dimensional space vehicle structure.