Educational hardware for feedback systems

This thesis explores a variety of educational feedback systems with an emphasis on developing them for in-class demonstrations and in-depth student projects. The nature of feedback systems means there is never a shortage of demonstrations or assignments that can truly capture the students' imagination and enthusiasm for class material. Unfortunately, it is sometimes the case that the feedback systems with the most potential for greatness are also unreliable, inaccurate, and inconsistent. This thesis attempts to narrow the gap by exploring, analyzing, and building a variety of exciting feedback systems. A comparison of general-purpose and high-performance operational amplifiers is created. Hardware for a web-based laboratory on canonical second-order systems is implemented. Cheap magnetic levitation kits for in-term projects are made even cheaper. And finally, the inverted pendulum - a decades-old Course VI heirloom and featured demonstration - is restored to its past glory.

Department dc:contributor.department

Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Dept. of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science.

Grantor dc:publisher

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Year dc:date.issued

2004

Author dc:creator

• Dancy, Isaac

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Kent Lundberg.

• Electrical Engineering and Computer Science.

Statement dc:rights

• M.I.T. theses are protected by copyright. They may be viewed from this source for any purpose, but reproduction or distribution in any format is prohibited without written permission. See provided URL for inquiries about permission.

Licence dc:rights.uri

• http://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/7582

Language dc:language.iso

eng

Handle dc:identifier.uri

http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/33128

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:dspace.mit.edu:1721.1/33128