STABILITY ANALYSIS OF

FEEDBACK SYSTEMS
Engr. Rainier Gomez
Introduction
• Previously, a system was considered unstable if, after it had been
disturbed by an input change, its output ‘took off’ and did not return
to the initial state of rest.

• A dynamic system is considered to be stable if for every bounded

input, it produces a bounded output regardless of its initial state.
• Let us consider a dynamic system with input m and output y. Its
dynamic behavior can be described by a transfer function G(s),

•𝑦 𝑠 =𝐺 𝑠 𝑚 𝑠

• If G(s) has a pole with positive real part, it gives rise to a term 𝐶1 𝑒 𝑝𝑡
which grows continuously with time, thus producing an unstable
system.
Stabilization with P Control
• Consider a process with the following response:
10 5
•𝑦 𝑠 = 𝑠−1
𝑚 𝑠 + 𝑠−1
𝑑 𝑠

• Clearly, this process is unstable. A proportional controller is to be

used to stabilize this system. What value of 𝐾𝑐 should the controller
have for the system response to be stable? Assume that 𝐺𝑓 and 𝐺𝑚
are both equal to unity.
Destabilization of a Stable Process with PI
Control
• Consider a second-order process with the following transfer function:
1
• 𝐺𝑝 𝑠 = 𝑠2 +2𝑠+2

• Therefore, according to our criterion, the system is stable. If a PI

controller with 𝐾𝐶 = 100 and 𝜏𝐼 = 0.1, check the stability of the
system.
The Characteristic Equation
• 1 + 𝐺𝑐 𝐺𝑓 𝐺𝑝 𝐺𝑚 = 0

• Let 𝑝1 , 𝑝2 , … 𝑝𝑛 be the n roots of the characteristic equation. Then we

can state the following criterion for the stability of a closed loop
system:
• A feedback control system is stable if all the roots of its characteristic
equation have negative real parts.
Routh-Hurwitz Criterion for Stability
• 1 + 𝐺𝑝 𝐺𝑓 𝐺𝑐 𝐺𝑚 = 𝑎0 𝑠 𝑛 + 𝑎1 𝑠 𝑛−1 + ⋯ + 𝑎𝑛−1 𝑠 + 𝑎𝑛 = 0

• Set 𝑎0 to be positive. If it is negative, multiply the equation by -1.

• First test. If any of the coefficients 𝑎1 , 𝑎2 , … , 𝑎𝑛−1 , 𝑎𝑛 is negative,

there is at least one root which has a positive real part. Hence, the
system is unstable. No further analysis needed.
• Second test. If all coefficients 𝑎0 , 𝑎1 , 𝑎2 … 𝑎𝑛−1 , 𝑎𝑛 are positive, then
from the first test we cannot conclude anything about the nature of
the roots. From the following array (known as the Routh array):

Row
1 𝑎0 𝑎2 𝑎4 …
2 𝑎1 𝑎3 𝑎5 …
3 𝐴1 𝐴2 …
4 𝐵1 𝐵2 …
5 … …
 𝑎1 𝑎2 −𝑎0 𝑎3 𝑎1 𝑎4 −𝑎0 𝑎5
𝐴1 = ; 𝐴 2 = …
𝑎1 𝑎1

𝐴1 𝑎3 − 𝑎1 𝐴2 𝐴1 𝑎5 − 𝑎1 𝐴3
𝐵1 = ; 𝐵2 =
𝐴1 𝐴1
…