The purposes of this research are to formulate
the equation of motion of the system, to develop computational
codes by a finite-element method in order to perform dynamics
simulation with vibration control, to propose an effective
control scheme and to confirm the calculated results by
experiments of a flexible link manipulator. The system used in
this paper consists of an aluminum beam as a flexible link, a
clamp-part, a servo motor to rotate the link and a piezoelectric
actuator to control vibration. Computational codes on time
history responses, FFT (Fast Fourier Transform) processing
and eigenvalues - eigenvectors analysis were developed to
calculate the dynamic behavior of the link. Furthermore, a
control scheme using the piezoelectric actuator was designed to
suppress the vibration. A proportional controller was designed
and demonstrated its performances. The system and the
proposed control scheme were confirmed through experiments.
The calculated and experimental results revealed that the
vibration of the flexible link manipulator can be controlled
effectively.