International Conference on Instrumentation, Control & Automation

ICA2009
October 20-22, 2009, Bandung, Indonesia

Port Automation: Modeling and Control of Container Cranes

Keum-Shik Hong* and Quang Hieu Ngo**
*
Dept. of Cogno-Mechatronics Engineering and School of Mechanical Engineering, Pusan National University
**
School of Mechanical Engineering, Pusan National University
30 Jangjeon-dong, Geumjeong-gu, Busan, 609-735, Korea.
E-mails: {kshong, }@pusan.ac.kr

Abstract
The container crane is a key machine in ports. Over the past
15 years, modeling and control of quay cranes for
automating ports has been the main research issue. In this
paper, crane models and control methodologies appeared in
the literature are reviewed. A generalized formulation of
the most widely used crane model is introduced. Various
control techniques are briefly discussed. In conclusion, an
amenable control strategy as well as a plausible model is
recommended.
Keywords: crane, dynamics, control, pendulum motion,
port automation.
1. Introduction
Since containers were introduced to the world-trade
industry, an increasing number of goods are being put into
these containers and loaded onto vessels to be carried to
their respective destinations over the world. When a vessel
arrives at a port, containers destined for this port must be
unloaded and new containers which are bound for other
ports must be loaded before the vessel can resume its trip.
Demands on container ports to perform the loading and
unloading process with maximum efficiency will become
greater as transport companies continue to increase both the
size of their fleets and also the capacity of the vessels. The
problem with this increase is that port authorities are
predicting that they will run out of space to expand their
operational areas and the option of developing on
surrounding land is often hampered from local residents.
Therefore, the only remaining solution will be the reduction
of the amount of time that the vessel needs to remain in
dock. The way to do this is to ensure that the container
unload/load process is done as rapidly as possible, and this
can be achieved by ensuring that the equipments in the port
such as quay cranes (QCs), automated guide vehicles
(AGVs), automated lift vehicles (ALVs) and so on, must be
operated at their maximum efficiencies (Thurston et al.,
2002).
The unloading/loading container process from/to the vessel
to/from yard is performed by QCs, trucks or AGVs. One to
six QCs are assigned to pick up containers depending on
the vessel size. Each crane will be responsible for several
rows of container storage slots along the ship. For each row,
the QC must first unload all the containers destined for this
port, and then load all the containers scheduled for leaving
this port. Containers will be carried between the QCs and
the yard by AGVs or trucks. An increasing number of
trucks or AGVs will catch of the unloading/loading
container demand. Because of the space limitation, the QCs
cannot be assigned more to serve the vessel. Thus, the
unloading/loading efficiency depends on how fast the
container is unloaded/loaded by QCs. However, the fast
trolley movement of the QC sways the container during its
movement, the main issue in a crane system is the quick
suppression of vibrations caused by the trolley motion. In
addition, a residual sway occurs at the end of the trolley
movement due to crane dynamics and disturbances like
winds. Thus, researchers working in the area of crane
control have always targeted sway suppression. More
generally, payload oscillations and the need to suppress
them have been identified as a bottleneck in the operations
of the transportation and construction industries even
where relatively simple gantry crane are concerned. The
control methods developed for the conventional cranes can
be applied to container cranes as well.
The paper is organized as follows: The modeling of crane
systems is addressed in Section 2. The control strategies for
cranes are described in Section 3. In Section 4, the
development of the container crane in the future is
introduced. Conclusions are given in Section 5.
2. Modeling crane systems
In modeling crane dynamics, two approaches are used. The
first approach is the lumped-mass approach, in which the
Fig. 1. Loading/unloading process (Hamburg Port
Consulting GmbH)

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ICA2009
October 20-22, 2009, Bandung, Indonesia
hoisting rope is modeled as a mass-less rigid rod and the
payload is modeled as a lumped point mass. The sway
motion is modeled as a pendulum motion in two or three
dimensional space. Therefore, an ordinary differential
equation (ODE) model is used in deriving the control laws.
Another approach is the distributed parameter system
approach, in which the hoisting rope is considered as a
string (distributed-mass). A typical assumption in the
second approach is that the rope is perfectly flexible and
inextensible. In this case, the dynamics of the crane system
is expressed as a coupled ODE and partial differential
equation (PDE): the trolley motion is given in the ODE
form and the rope dynamics is given in the PDE form. By
using the PDE form, the payload as well as the rope motion
is described exactly, especially when the rope length is very
large and the payload is very heavy. In addition, the
vibration of the rope that affects the payload motion during
the trolley movement is also more accurately suppressed.
2.1. Lumped-mass models
The most popular model of gantry cranes augments the
planar version of the pendulum model with the motion of
gantry in the horizontal direction as shown in Fig.2.
The (simplest) linear equations of motion of the gantry
crane are as follows.
M&x& mg = F ,
&x& + l&& + g = 0 ,
where M and m are the masses of the trolley and the load,
respectively, l is the rope length, x is the trolley position and
is the sway angle. It is noted that the linear natural
frequency of the pendulum is dependent on the trolley and
the payload masses.
(M + m)g
= .
Ml
Omar et al. (2005) further augmented this model with a
friction force affecting the trolley motion. The friction was
estimated and cancelled by applying an opposite control
action.
Fig.2. Schematic diagram of a gantry crane with the
lumped-mass model.
2009 ICA, ISBN 978-979-8861-05-5
Liu et al. (2005) derived the equations of the motion of a
two-dimensional overhead crane. System linearization
transformed the two-dimensional system to two
independent systems: X-direction transport system and
Y-direction transport system. Both the two systems were
the same dynamic models; each of them was described by
the simple pendulum model.
Hong et al. (2000) introduced a simple model with an
equation describing the dynamics of the cable hoisting. The
container was lifted using the hoist motor, while it was
lowered by the total weight of the spreader and the
container. By winding the trolley rope around trolley drum,
the trolley was pulled to a desire spot. During the trolley
movement, the container was swayed and it was suppressed
by controlling the trolley motion.
Takagi et al. (2003) dealt with modeling and control of a
crane mounted on a tower-like flexible structure. A fast
transfer of the load can sway of the load and vibration of the
flexible structure. Controlling both the sway and the
vibration by the inherent capability of the tower crane was
objectives of the paper. Their paper described the design of
a centralized control system considering coupling of
between the up-and-down direction and the rotational
direction. The comparison of experiments and analysis
showed that the decentralized control system had almost
(1) the same performance and stability as the centralized one.
2.2. Distributed-mass models
(2)
The model available in this category is the planar model for
a gantry crane linearized around the cables equilibrium
position as shown in Fig.3.
The governing equation and boundary conditions are
following.
2 w( y, t ) w( y, t )
P( y, t ) = 0 ,0< y <l , (4)
(3) t
2
y y
2 w(0, t ) w(0, t )
P(0, t ) = f g (t ) ,
(5)
M
t
2
y
Fig. 3. Schematic diagram of a gantry crane with the
distributed-mass model.
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October 20-22, 2009, Bandung, Indonesia
2 w(l , t ) w(l , t )
m + P(l , t ) =0,
t
2
y
where M and m are the masses of the trolley and the load,
respectively, fg is the input force applied to the trolley, w(y,t)
is the transverse motion of the cable around its equilibrium
position, y is a curvilinear coordinate representing the
arc-length along the cable, is the mass per unit length of
the cable, P(y,t) is the tension in the cable,
P( y, t ) mg + g (l y ) .
d'Andrea-Novel et al. (1994, 2000, 2002) used this model
for overhead cranes and provided the asymptotic stability
of a closed-loop system under the assumption that the rope
length was constant. Baicu et al. (1998) extended this
model and applied to a gantry robot for flexible link. The
electrical subsystem dynamics for a permanent magnet
brushed DC motor coupled with the link dynamics to form
a hybrid system of partial and ordinary differential
equations. Rahn et al. (1999) also used the simple PDEs
model and applied control law to stabilize the gantry crane
system.
Kim et al. (2009) augmented the simple model with an
axially moving system concept. Because the load was
hoisted up and down during the trolley motion, the crane
was modeled as an axially moving string system. The
dynamics of the moving string were derived using
Hamiltons principle for systems with changing mass.
3. Controlling crane systems
Researchers in the crane control area have developed many
methods to control the sway motion of the load. Two
popular categories in crane control are open loop control
such as input shaping control, optimal control and so on,
and close loop control such as state feedback, nonlinear
control, fuzzy control, adaptive control and so on.
3.1. Input shaping and optimal control
The command shaping is a reference signal modification
technique that is implementable in real time. However,
command shaping does not have closed-loop mechanisms
of feedback control. Therefore, it must be used in
conjunction with a feedback control if it is used for
disturbance rejection.
Hong et al. (2003) introduced a path planning for the
purpose of facilitating understanding of the semi-
automatics modes. In actual semi-automatic operation
mode, the four paths were continuous (AB hoisting up,
manual mode, BC hoisting up and travelling of the trolley,
auto mode, CD traveling of the trolley, auto mode, DE
hoisting down, manual mode). A modified input shaping
control methodology had been presented to restrict the
swing angle of the pay load within a specified value during
the transfer to minimize the residual vibration at the end
point. The conventional method was enhanced by adding
one more constraint to limit the transient sway angle within
2009 ICA, ISBN 978-979-8861-05-5
a specified value using the sway angle based on a linear
(6) time invariant system.
Sorensen et al. (2007) developed a combined feedback and
input shaping controller enabling precise positioning and
sway reduction in bridge and gantry cranes. The first
feedback module detected and compensated for positioning
error. The second module detected and rejected
disturbances. Input shaping was used in a third module to
mitigate motion induced oscillation.
(7) Al-Garni et al. (1995) developed a nonlinear dynamic
model of the overhead crane. The optimal control scheme
was applied to control the overhead crane to satisfy the
minimize sway and final time.
Hong et al. (2000) proposed a two-stage control of
container cranes. The first stage control was a modified
time-optimal control with feedback for the purpose of fast
trolley traveling. The second stage control was a nonlinear
control for the quick suppression of the residual sway while
lowering the container at the target trolley position. The
secondary control combined the partial feedback
linearization to account for the unknown nonlinearities as
much as possible and the variable structure control to
account for the un-modeled dynamics and disturbances.
Klosinski (2005) developed a mathematical model included
a crane model and a control system. A desired input signal
consisting of three phase which were able to change depend
on the rope length was applied to control system.
Terashima et al. (2007) presented an open-loop control
strategy for sway-free, point-to-point motion of a load mass
in the three-dimensional motion of a rotary crane. In order
to suppress the sway of the load during transfer and the
residual sway after transfer, an optimal control method was
applied. The minimum time-control problem was
considered in case of the rope length was varied. The
minimum time control was also compared to the
pre-shaping control, which effectively controls vibration.
Singhose et al. (2000) presented the dynamic behavior of a
planar gantry crane with hoisting of the load. The command
generation method of input shaping was proposed for
reduction of the residual vibration. Several versions of
input shaping were evaluated and compared with
time-optimal rigid-body commands over a wide range of
parameters. Input shaping provided significant reduction in
both the residual and transient oscillations, even when the
hoisting distance was a large percentage of the cable length.
Borsc et al. (2008) introduced a control strategy based on
the changing structure of a control system, ie, on controlled
jump changes of the control system parameters, ensures
more rapid stabilization than a control system with constant
parameters. An algorithm of the time-optimal stabilization
was designed in accordance with the Pontriagins
maximum principle in such a way that the resulting
behaviour was non-periodic. The designed control
algorithm divided the state space into segments in which
the parameters took their limit values. The control problem
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was resolved for third-order and higher linear systems. This
control strategy was applied to gantry crane to demonstrate
the system robustness.
Optimal control and input shaping techniques are limited
by the fact that they are extremely sensitive to variations on
the parameter values about the nominal value and changes
in the initial conditions and external disturbances.
Therefore, they require highly accurate values of the
system parameters to achieve satisfactory system response.
Moreover, a couple of the feedback control and input
shaping or optimal control should be used to improve the
control performance of sensitive systems.
3.2. Linear and nonlinear control
Kim et al. (2004) designed a state feedback controller with
an integrator to control a real container crane. The
inclinometer was used instead of a vision system, while
providing almost the same performance. A number of
observers to estimate the angular velocity of the load and
the trolley velocity were presented.
Park et al. (2007) developed a nonlinear anti-sway
controller crane with hoisting. The container crane
involved a planar motion in conjunction with the hoisting
motion. A novel feedback linearization control law
provided a simultaneous trolley position regulation, sway
suppression and load hoisting control. The advantage of the
proposed control law lay in the full incorporation of the
nonlinear dynamics by partial feedback linearization.
Neyfeh et al. (2008) developed a nonlinear model of the
crane system by modeling the crane-hoist-payload
assembly as a double pendulum. They derived a linear
approximation specific to this model and a cubic model of
the dynamics for nonlinear analysis. Using linear analysis,
the gain and time delay factors for stabilizing controllers
were determined. Also, they showed that the controller
underwent a Hopf bifurcation at the linear stability
boundary. Using the method of multiple scales on the cubic
model, the normal form of the Hopf bifurcation was
determined. The controller underwent a supercritical
bifurcation that helped explain the robustness of the
controller.
Schaub (2008) proposed a method used two active ship
motion compensation strategies to stabilize the payload
during perator-controlled at sea cargo transfer scenarios
using ship-based cranes. A new ship motion sensing
strategy was developed using only inertial measurement
unit (IMU) information to reduce the cost and complexity
of the ship motion sensors, while improving the overall
crane performance. A new rate-based control strategy was
developed which directly computed required crane joint
rates to isolate the payload from the ship motion.
Ghigliazza et al. (2002) considered the dynamics of a tower
crane: a point mass suspended by a light cable (itself
assumed massless) from a horizontally moving support.
They derived general equations of motion, and analyzed
two cases in detail: the linearly accelerating support, and
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the support describing a circle at constant speed. They also
found steadily rotating solutions, discuss their stability and
bifurcations, and provide a partial characterization of
global orbit structures.
Moustafa et al. (1988) derived a nonlinear dynamical
model for an overhead crane. The model took into account
simultaneous travel and transverse motions of the crane.
The aim was to transport an object along a specified
transport route in such a way that the swing angles were
suppressed as quickly as possible. An anti-swing control
system which adopts a feedback control to specify the crane
speed at every moment was adopted. The gain matrix was
chosen such that a desired rate of decay of the swing angles
was obtained.
Messineo et al. (2008) proposed a novel feedback
controller for cranes employed in heavy-lift offshore
marine operations. The control objective was to reduce the
hydrodynamic slamming load acting on a payload at
water-entry of moonpool operations; at the same time the
values of the wire tension must be kept within acceptable
bounds.
Hicar et al. proposed robust control by Ackermann to
ensure crane robustness against the burden weight and rope
length variation, which provides sharp positioning and
forbidden swinging of the burden in the final position. The
real crane will be connected to a distributed control system
(DSR). An analysis of the working place was performed
with accent on the measurable units of burden swinging,
and the results of robust controlling were described.
Yoshida et al. (1992) designed a saturating control law
which satisfied a constrained input condition and gave an
upper bound of a given quadratic performance index, using
a unique guaranteed cost control method. This controller
was applied to a crane system to show the practicability of
the control law.
Wahyudi et al. (2007) developed a sensorless automatic
gantry crane control strategy using reference modifier. A
reference modifier was introduced to produce antiswing
cart motion.
3.3. Boundary control
Rahn et al. (1999) developed a proportional, derivative, and
coupling amplification control law that applied to the
system boundary (gantry motion) to stabilize the flexible
cable gantry crane. A root locus analysis based on
Galerkins method for tuning control gains was another
interesting feature of their work.
Baicu et al. (1998) used backstepping boundary control to
drive a flexible-link gantry robot as a gantry crane by using
a brushed DC motor. The electrical subsystem dynamics
for a permanent magnet brushed DC motor coupled with
the link dynamics to form a hybrid system of partial and
ordinary differential equations. A boundary voltage control
law was developed based on Lyapunov theory for
distributed parameter systems. Through an embedded
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ICA2009
October 20-22, 2009, Bandung, Indonesia
desired-current control law, the integrator back-stepping
controller generated the desired control force on the
mechanical subsystem. A velocity observer estimated the
gantry velocity, eliminating one feedback sensor. Modal
analysis and Galerkins method generated the close loop
modal dynamics.
d'Andrea-Novel et al. (1994) established the uniform
exponential stability of the closed-loop system of their
original problem by adding an angular-velocity feedback of
the rope in addition to the displacement feedback, the
velocity of the trolley and the angular-displacement of the
rope. Moreover, dAndrea-Novel and Coron (2000)
proposed a torque control to stabilize an overhead crane
with a variable-length flexible cable.
Kim et al. (2009) applied the Lyapunov function method to
derive a boundary control law, where the Lyapunov
function candidate took the form of the total mechanical
energy of the system. The boundary control law utilized the
hoisting speed as well as the sway angle of the rope at the
gantry side.
3.4. Fuzzy control
Benhidieb et al. (1995) described the comparison of a fuzzy
logic control system with the Linear Quadratic Gaussian
control (LQG) of an overhead crane, considering the
applicability of the control algorithms in real time and
assuming that the model was representative of the real
system. A number of possible perturbations were examined
in a study of the robustness of the control algorithms.
Chen et al. (2009) considered a practical overhead crane
control problem of designing a fuzzy control to ensure that
the trolley arrives precisely at its destination; the load
swing angle approaches to zero, and the energy of input and
states is minimized. Furthermore, the constraints for the
overhead crane operation were also considered and
satisfied. Those constraints were that when the crane is
moving, the swing angle has to be small; the swing speed
has to be slow, and the moving force is limited. The fuzzy
descriptor system was chosen to represent the dynamics of
the overhead crane, and a guaranteed cost fuzzy control
design was proposed for the fuzzy descriptor system.
Moreover, this study also illustrated why the fuzzy
descriptor system instead of traditional TS fuzzy system
was selected here as the model of the overhead crane.
Chang et al. (2008) presented a novel method that
accelerated transportation and minimized the payload
swing of the overhead cranes. Based on the inertia theorem,
this method did not need a complex dynamic model for a
crane system, but rather used trolley position and swing
angle data to design the proposed fuzzy projection
controller. An enhanced fuzzy algorithm was also utilized
to eliminate the dead-zone problem. The feasibility and
effectiveness of the proposed scheme were also compared
with those of the conventional PD and nonlinear coupling
methods.
Chang et al. (2009) proposed a new accelerated method for
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rapid and smooth transportation of a nonlinear 3-D crane.
Based on the projection vectors of swing angles on 2-D
plane and the remaining distance to the destination, this
approach was able to be easily incorporated into an
intelligent fuzzy controller.
Wahyudi et al. (2007) introduced a practical and intelligent
control method for automatic gantry crane. The design of
proposed method was based on a simple open-loop
experiment and without the need either to model crane or
perform system identification. The effectiveness of the
proposed method as well as the robustness to parameter
variations were evaluated experimentally in a lab-scale
gantry crane system. Its performance was also compared
with that of classical PID and fuzzy logic controllers.
Yi et al. (2003) proposed a new fuzzy controller for
anti-swing and position control of an overhead traveling
crane based on the Single Input Rule Modules (SIRMs)
dynamically connected fuzzy inference model. The trolley
position and velocity, the rope swing angle and angular
velocity were selected as the input items, and the trolley
acceleration as the output item. Each input item was given
with a SIRM and a dynamic importance degree. The control
system was proved to be asymptotically stable to the
destination. The controller was robust to different rope
lengths and had generalization ability for different initial
positions.
Ahmad (2009) presented the use of anti-sway angle control
approaches for a two-dimensional overhead gantry crane
with disturbances effect in the dynamic system. Delayed
Feedback Signal (DFS) and proportional-derivative
(PD)-type fuzzy logic controller were the techniques used
in this investigation to actively control the sway angle of
the rope of gantry crane system. A nonlinear overhead
gantry crane system was considered and the dynamic model
of the system was derived using the Euler-Lagrange
formulation. Performances of both controllers are
examined in terms of sway suppression, disturbances
cancellation, time response specifications and input force.
Cho et al. proposed a new fuzzy anti-swing control scheme
for a three-dimensional overhead crane. The proposed
control consisted of a position servo control and a
fuzzy-logic control. The position servo control was used to
control crane position and rope length, and the fuzzy-logic
control was used to suppress load swing. The proposed
control guaranteed not only prompt suppression of load
swing but also accurate control of crane position and rope
length for simultaneous travel, traverse, and hoisting
motions of the crane. Furthermore, the proposed control
provided practical gain tuning criteria for easy application.
3.4. Adaptive control
Corriga et al. (1998) considered a linear parameter-varying
model of the crane, where the time-varying parameter was
the length of the suspending rope. The set of models given
by frozen values of the rope length was considered to show
how all these models have been reduced to a single
time-invariant model using suitable time scaling. The time
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scaling relation has been used to derive a control law for the
time-varying system that implemented an implicit gain
scheduling. Using a Lyapunov-like theorem, it was also
possible to find relative upper bounds for the rate of change
of the varying parameter that ensured the stability of the
time varying system.
Hua et al. (2007) proposed a nonlinear control scheme
incorporating parameter adaptive mechanism to ensure the
overall closed-loop system stability. By applying the
designed controller, the position error has been driven to
zero while the sway angle was rapidly damped to achieve
swing stabilization. Stability proof of the overall system
was given in terms of Lyapunov concept.
Chang et al. (2007) provided an effective all-purpose
adaptive fuzzy controller for the crane. This method did not
need the complex dynamic model of the crane system, but it
used trolley position and swing angle information instead to
design the fuzzy controller. An adaptive algorithm was
provided to tune the free parameters in the crane control
system. External disturbance, such as the wind and the hit,
which always deteriorates the control performance, was
also discussed in the paper to verify the robustness of the
proposed adaptive fuzzy algorithm.
Cheng et al. (1996) developed a robust controller which
combined a feedback linearization approach and a time
delay control scheme. The time delay control was applied
to complete the feedback linearization for a nonlinear
system under the influence of uncertainty.
Johansen et al. (2003) developed a new strategy for active
control in heavy-lift offshore crane operations by
introducing a new concept referred to as wave
synchronization. Wave synchronization reduced the
hydrodynamic forces by minimizing variations in the
relative vertical velocity between payload and water using a
wave-amplitude measurement. Wave synchronization was
combined with conventional active heave compensation to
obtain accurate control.
Messineo et al. (2009) designed an adaptive controller for
cranes employed in heavy-lift offshore marine operations.
The control objective was to reduce the hydrodynamic
slamming load acting on a payload at water entry of
moonpool operations, while letting the payload tracked a
given velocity profile. The adopted solution relied upon the
use of an adaptive observer and two adaptive external
models of the disturbance, employed to recover the
unavailable information about the error to be regulated. As
a result, the closed-loop system was rendered adaptive with
respect to both the plant parameters and the frequencies of
the harmonic disturbances affecting the system. A
certainty-equivalence controller which made use of the
estimated parameters and the reconstructed tracking error
was proposed, and the performance of the overall scheme
was verified experimentally on a scale-model.
3.5. Sliding mode control
Liu et al. (2005) proposed a sliding mode fuzzy control for
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both X-direction and Y-direction transport. According to
the influences on system dynamic performance, both the
slope of sliding mode surface and the coordination between
the two subsystems was automatically tuned by real time
fuzzy inference respectively. The effectiveness of the
proposed control approach was demonstrated.
Lee et al. (2006) proposed a sliding mode anti-swing for
overhead cranes. A sliding-mode anti-swing trajectory
control scheme was designed based on the Lyapunov
stability theorem, where a sliding surface, coupling the
trolley motion with load swing, was adopted for a direct
damping control of load swing. The proposed control
guaranteed asymptotic stability while keeping all internal
signals bounded. In association with a new anti-swing
motion planning scheme, the proposed control realized a
typical anti-swing trajectory control in practice, allowing
high-speed load-hoisting motion and sufficient damping of
load swing. The proposed control was simple for a
real-time implementation with high-frequency sampling.
Bartolini et al. (2002) proposed a simple control scheme,
based on second-order sliding modes. It guaranteed a fast
and precise load transfer and the swing suppression during
the load movement, despite of model uncertainties and
unmodeled dynamic actuators.
4. Crane control in the future
In the future, the size of containers ship becomes bigger and
they may not be accessible to the port because of shallow
water. Containers will be transferred from/to larger ships
to/from smaller ships offshore. A typical arrangement is to
place two ships side by side. A small ship has cranes. Along
one side of the crane ship is the large container ship. The
container crane in the smaller ship will pick up containers
and transfer between the two ships. The smaller ship will
move containers to the port and the crane in the small ship
can unload the containers to the ground, by removing the
possibility of constructing an expensive port facility.
The sea state is a very important factor in this operation.
The sea-excited motion of the crane ship can excite large
pendulations of the containers while they are suspended by
the cables of the cranes. The large motions can be due to
either large excitation amplitudes or small excitation
amplitudes near resonant conditions. Therefore, the
container cranes have to compensate for the motions
induced on the suspended load by the sea wave, wind and
other external disturbances as the majority of crane systems
used offshore.
5. Conclusions
In the literature, nonlinear control models including the
feedback linearization occupied the majority of the works
done on crane control. The simplified model was used to
develop many control strategies, from opened loop control
to feedback control. However, this model seems not
sufficient when cranes become bigger: the rope length is
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very large; the payload is too heavy, and so on. Then, the
distributed-mass model can be used to design a control
algorithm because it describes exactly the crane system.
The main difficulty is how to design control laws in a
systematic way.
Many significant research efforts have been attemped to the
development of control strategies to improve the efficiency
and safety of the cranes. The input shaping technique has
shown an ability to control crane systems but it is not robust
enough to be used for many cranes. They are not robust
enough to reject external disturbance and to stabilize the
payload under uncertain crane parameters. The
combination between linear control and input shaping
techniques are able to be a control strategy candidate.
However, they are also not robust enough to allow for
variation in the hoisting cable length, payload mass and
high trolley speed. Fuzzy logic and adaptive control are
plausible candidates for crane control. A combination of all
these methods is also a good strategy when it allows
variations of the rope length, payload and trolley masses,
etc. However, it is remarked that the design of a hybrid
controller to produce robust and efficiency control strategy
is not a trivial issue.
Acknowledgment
This work was supported by the Mobile Harbor Project of
the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology
funded by the Ministry of Education, Science and
Technology, Korea.
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