The purposes of this research are to derive the equations of motion of a flexible two-link system by a finite-element method, to develop computational codes in order to perform
dynamics simulations with vibration control and to propose an effective control scheme of a flexible two-link manipulator. The flexible two-link manipulator used in this paper consists of two aluminum beams as flexible links, two clamp-parts, two servo motors to rotate the links and two piezoelectric actuators 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 links. Furthermore, a control scheme using the piezoelectric actuators was designed to suppress the vibration. Two proportional-derivative (PD) controllers were designed and demonstrated their performances. The calculated results of the controlled two-link manipulator revealed that the vibration of the flexible manipulator can be controlled effectively.