CONTROLLING THE POSITION OF A STEPPER MOTOR USING CONVENTIONAL CONTROL APPROACH EMBEDDED IN A PLC

In this paper, a non-conventional control strategy is integrated with a Programmable Logic Controller (PLC) for the precise position control of an integrated Stepper Motor (SM). Special function modules were used to generate the pulses and to read the encoder signal from the motor. IEC 61131-3 programming code was incorporated in the form of ladder logic diagram, function blocks, and structured text. This research focuses on the control of position and speed of the motor, leveraging the capabilities of control strategies embedded within a PLC. Proportional Integral Derivative (PID) which is one of the traditional control strategies used in industrial automation processes is implemented within PLC next engineer. This research integrates control strategy into PLC platforms to achieve superior control accuracy. The study uses a combination of simulation, experimentation, and real-world application to validate the proposed approach's effectiveness. The inbuilt PID block within PLC was implemented and later the PD model developed and compiled in Simulink was integrated with PLC. The study shows that importance of sampling time and micro stepping in achieving precise positioning. The findings demonstrate that there was successful integration of Simulink with PLC for implementing control strategies. Detailed analyses of motor position and speed under varying conditions highlight the system's adaptability and responsiveness. PD (Proportional Derivative) showed effective results in controlling the position by minimizing the overshoot. This research concludes that the integration of Simulink with PLCs offers a robust solution for achieving precise and dynamic control over motor position.