Resumen
This paper presents the study of linear Offset-Free Model Predictive Control (OF-MPC) for an Active Magnetic Bearing (AMB) application. The method exploits the advantages of classical MPC in terms of stability and control performance and, at the same time, overcomes the effects of the plant-model mismatch on reference tracking. The proposed approach is based on a disturbance observer with an augmented plant model including an input disturbance estimation. Besides the abovementioned advantages, this architecture allows a real-time estimation of low-frequency disturbance, such as slow load variations. This property can be of great interest for a variety of AMB systems, particularly where the knowledge of the external load is important to regulate the behavior of the controlled plant. To this end, the paper describes the modeling and design of the OF-MPC architecture and its experimental validation for a one degree of freedom AMB system. The effectiveness of the method is demonstrated in terms of the reference tracking performance, cancellation of plant-model mismatch effects, and low-frequency disturbance estimation.