Question

If the damping factor is less than the damping factor at critical damping, the time response of the system is ___________

(a) Underdamped

(b) Overdamped

(c) Marginally damped

(d) Unstable

I had been asked this question in an international level competition.

I would like to ask this question from Time Response of Control Systems topic in division Control System Applications of MATLAB

Answer 1

Correct choice is (a) Underdamped

The explanation: If the damping factor is less than the damping factor at critical damping i.e. the natural frequency, the damping ratio becomes less than 1. This makes the system underdamped since the response of the system becomes a decaying sinusoid in nature.