Experimental Black-box System identification and control of a Torus Cassegrain Telescope

TL;DR

This paper presents an experimental approach to black-box system identification and control of a Torus Cassegrain telescope to enhance its tracking precision, using identified models for designing various control strategies.

Contribution

It introduces a black-box modeling method for the telescope's motors and sensors, and develops control laws based on these models to improve tracking accuracy.

Findings

Successful identification of the telescope's black-box system.

Implementation of PID and state-feedback controllers.

Improved tracking performance demonstrated.

Abstract

The Astronomical Observatory of the Sergio Arboleda University (Bogota, Colombia) has as main instrument a Torus Classic Cassegrain telescope. In order to improve its precision and accuracy in the tracking of celestial objects, the Torus telescope requires to be properly automated. The motors, drivers and sensors of the telescope are modelled as a black-box systems and experimentally identified. Using the identified model several control laws are developed such as Proportional, Integral and Derivative (PID) control and State-feedback control for the velocity and position tracking and disturbance-rejection tasks.