Tracking and synchronisation for a class of PWA systems

In this paper, the tracking problem for a class of discontinuous piecewise affine (PWA) systems is addressed. We propose an observer-based output-feedback control design, consisting of a feedforward, a piecewise affine feedback law and a model-based observer, solving the tracking problem. These synthesis results can also be employed to tackle the master–slave synchronisation problem for PWA systems. It is shown that for certain classes of PWA systems the design is characterised in terms of linear matrix inequalities. The results are illustrated by application to mechanical systems with discontinuous friction characteristics.