The development of controllers for underactuated systems with nonholonomic constraints has been a topic of significant interest for many researchers in recent years. These systems are hard to control because their linearization transform them into uncontrollable systems. The proposed approaches involve the use of a permanent excitation in the reference trajectory; coordinate transformation; discontinuities; or complex calculations. This paper proposes the design of the controller of the second-order chained form system for trajectory tracking by using a simpler approach based on linear algebra. Up to the present time, no controllers based on this approach have been designed for that system. The control problem is solved by setting two of the three systems variables as a reference, while the remaining variable is calculated imposing the condition that the equations system has an exact solution to ensure that tracking errors go to zero. The stability of the proposed controller is theoretically demonstrated, and simulations results show a suitable control system performance. Also, no coordinate transformation is necessary.
Review: Ecological Form: System and Aesthetics in the Age of Empire, edited by Nathan K. Hensley and Philip Steer
