Control Solutions for Vertical Three-Tank Systems

The paper presents the design of several classical low-cost control systems (CSs) with Integral Controllers (I), Proportional-Integral Controller (PI), Proportional-Integral-Derivative Controller (PID) and adaptive Proportional-Integral control systems dedicated to the level control of vertical three-tank systems (V3TS). To design the proposed control solutions, the least-squares identification leads to the parameters of the transfer functions of the simplified models of V3TS. The CSs consist of several SISO control loops with separately tuned I, PI and PID controllers and adaptive PI controller. The Modulus Optimum method is applied to initially tune the parameters of the controllers. A comparative study of the suggested control structures is also given and validated by real-time experimental results.