Aerodynamics of Road- and Rail Vehicles

SUMMARY

The technical state-of-the-art of aerodynamics of ground transportation vehicles is reviewed. Currently available theoretical calculation methods and experimental simulation techniques as well as typical results illustrating the impact of aerodynamics on vehicle performance and running characteristics are summarized and the interactions between vehicle system dynamics and aerodynamics are adressed. Correlation of theoretical and experimental data show the present potential of vehicle aerodynamics and point to fields in which further research work is necessary.     

Modelling Combined Ride and Handling Manœuvres for a Vehicle with Slow-Active Suspension

SUMMARY

The computer modelling of vehicle ride and handling has been widely reported, but often only one or other of these functions is considered. This is especially true in the design of active suspension controllers, where the effects that improvements in the performance of one aspect have on the other are often not presented. This paper initially describes a combined ride and handling model for a large executive saloon fitted with a slow-active suspension. Separately derived ride and roll control strategies are combined and the effects on both ride and handling considered for straight running and various handling man?uvres on rough roads. The results are compared to the original passively suspended vehicle and the effect of running each strategy separately.     

Solution of the Multiple Wheel and Rail Contact Dynamic Problem

SUMMARY

An unconventional method for calculating the forces developing in the wheel and rail contact patches of a railway vehicle has been implemented at the New Technology Laboratory of INRETS. It takes into account the elastic deformations of the materials in the Hertzian elliptical contact areas; the possibility of having simultaneously several contact patches on each wheel, is introduced in the simulation of the dynamic phenomena.

The theory is applied for a high speed bogie running on a perfectly straight track.     

Prediction of Wheel/Rail Profile Wear

SUMMARY

The alteration in wheel and rail profiles due to wear involves considerable vehicle and track-maintenance costs, and influences the loading capacity of the rails, as well as the operation safety and riding comfort of the vehicles. In the past twenty years a vehicle dynamics, contact mechanics and tribology based research work has emerged which is also recently continuous in an international scale, and this research is more and more intensive. Parallel to the growing possibilities of computer based analyses, several algorithms and numerical procedures have been elaborated, as well as measurement based experiments have been carried out to establish the reliable prediction of wear-caused wheel and rail profile alterations and to maximise the mileage performance by selecting the optimum vehicle system parameters for running gears operating on a selected railway line or a whole network under specified -in general inherently stochastic - traffic conditions. This paper takes an attempt to introduce the extended sphere of problems of wheel and rail wear prediction, as well as the latest results reflecting the present state of the art.     

Critical Speed and Limit Speed in Phenomena of Lateral Instability on Railway Vehicles

SUMMARY

A comparison between theoretical calculations on dynamic lateral behaviour of railway vehicles and experimental results shows quite a sizeable difference between the calculated critical speed and the actual speed at which side impact phenomena will repeatedly occur between wheel flange and rail (running speed limit), such impact speed being remarkably lower than calculated.

Another typical experimental aspect is that the running speed limit will considerably vary for the same vehicle depending on the test track conditions. Such difference is usually attributed to alterations of the wheel-rail contact surfaces, only.

This paper will discuss some concurrent causes which may prove far from negligible, such as the effects of track defects, an amplification of the dynamic lateral displacement between wheel and rail on approaching the critical speed, the track mechanical properties, and in particular the track lateral rigidity.

The influence of some geometrical factors typical of the wheel-rail contact, such as side clearance and linearized conicity, will also be discussed. The approach is based on the application of statistical methods to dynamic linear systems.     

Emergency steering control of autonomous vehicle for collision avoidance and stabilisation

ABSTRACT

Collision avoidance and stabilisation are two of the most crucial concerns when an autonomous vehicle finds itself in emergency situations, which usually occur in a short time horizon and require large actuator inputs, together with highly nonlinear tyre cornering response. In order to avoid collision while stabilising autonomous vehicle under dynamic driving situations at handling limits, this paper proposes a novel emergency steering control strategy based on hierarchical control architecture consisting of decision-making layer and motion control layer. In decision-making layer, a dynamic threat assessment model continuously evaluates the risk associated with collision and destabilisation, and a path planner based on kinematics and dynamics of vehicle system determines a collision-free path when it suddenly encounters emergency scenarios. In motion control layer, a lateral motion controller considering nonlinearity of tyre cornering response and unknown external disturbance is designed using tyre lateral force estimation-based backstepping sliding-mode control to track a collision-free path, and to ensure the robustness and stability of the closed-loop system. Both simulation and experiment results show that the proposed control scheme can effectively perform an emergency collision avoidance manoeuvre while maintaining the stability of autonomous vehicle in different running conditions.     

Straight-ahead running of road vehicles – analytical formulae including full tyre characteristics

ABSTRACT

During straight-ahead running, the longitudinal axis of road vehicles, notably cars, is not parallel to road axis. This occurrence is general and is due both to road cross slope (road banking) and to tyre characteristics, particularly ply-steer and conicity. In order to describe such a phenomenon, the paper develops a new and relatively simple analytical model. Despite the model is linear, the solution which is provided is exact, since straight-ahead motion occurs with small angles and both the elastokinematics of suspension system and tyre characteristics can be modelled by linearised equations. The Handling Diagram theory is updated and completed by introducing the actual shifts of tyre characteristics. The validation of the analytical expressions is performed by using a MSC Adams^TM full model of a car. A subjective-objective experimental test campaign provides preliminary substantiation of the ability of the derived formulae to describe tyre performance. By means of the unreferenced analytical formulae developed in the paper, we allow, given the vehicle, the proper tyre design specification and vice-versa. In particular, a formula is given to make null the steering torque during straight-ahead driving. The derived analytical formulae may provide a sound understanding of the straight-ahead running of road vehicles.     

Frequency Spectral Analysis of Bridge-Vehicle System due to Road Surface Roughness

SUMMARY

The paper presents a new method to study the dynamic properties of the bridge-vehicle system. The transfer function of the system is obtained by iteration in the frequency domain instead of the time domain. The relationship between vehicle speed and the lowest natural frequency of the system is investigated and a parametric study of the system stability is made. The varying parameters concerned are the vehicle speed, the ratio of vehicle mass to bridge mass, the ratio of vehicle eigenfrequency to bridge eigenfrequence, and the relative damping of the vehicle and bridge.     

A Reusability Study of Vehicle Lateral Control System

SUMMARY

The architecture of the PATH vehicle lateral control system is presented in this paper. The two main modules are an intelligent reference/sensing system, and an Frequency-Shaped-Linear-Quadratic/preview control algorithm. The whole lateral control system was formerly evaluated on a two-door test vehicle. It was transplanted to a four-door vehicle which is considerably different from the older two-door test vehicle in dynamic characteristics. The objective of this study is to investigate the reusability of our control system.     

Optimal roll control of an articulated vehicle: theory and model validation

This paper investigates optimal roll control of an experimental articulated vehicle. The test vehicle and the mathematical model used to design the control strategies are presented. The vehicle model is validated against experimental data from the test vehicle in passive configuration. The initial controller design, performed by Sampson (Sampson, D.J.M. and Cebon, D., 2003a, Achievable roll stability of heavy road vehicles. Proc. Instn. Mech. Engrs, Part D, J. Automobile Engineering, 217(4), 269–287), is reviewed and adapted for the experimental vehicle. The effect of not controlling all the axles on the vehicle is investigated and a variable vehicle speed controller is designed by interpolating between constant speed controllers. Substantial reduction in normalized load transfer is achieved for a range of manoeuvres, both in steady-state and transient conditions.     

Optimization for Vehicle Suspension I: Time Domain

SUMMARY

A numerical procedure for finding the optimum values of a number of parameters describing a model vehicle suspension has been studied. The vehicle has been modelled by dynamic systems of linear springs and dampers, and the goal is to obtain lower acceleration peaks at an elected design point in the vehicle.

The problem is stated as a mathematical programming problem which can be solved by means of the sequential linear programming technique. The procedure has been implemented for a four wheel independent suspension model capable of being subjected to road irregularities and to centrifugal and braking accelerations.     

Optimal Preview Control of Rear Suspension Using Nonlinear Neural Networks

SUMMARY

The performance of neural networks to be used for identification and optimal control of nonlinear vehicle suspensions is analyzed. It is shown that neuro-vehicle models can be efficiently trained to identify the dynamical characteristics of actual vehicle suspensions. After trained, this neuro-vehicle is used to train both front and rear suspension neuro-controllers under a nonlinear rear preview control scheme. To do that, a neuro-observer is trained to identify the inverse dynamics of the front suspension so that front road disturbances can be identified and used to improve the response of the rear suspension. The performance of the vehicle with neuro-control and with LQ control are compared.     

Effects of Model Complexity on the Performance of Automated Vehicle Steering Controllers: Controller Development and Evaluation

SUMMARY

Due to increased traffic congestion and travel times, research in Advanced Vehicle Control Systems (AVCS) has focused on automated lateral and headway control. Automated vehicles are seen as a way to increase freeway capacity and vehicle speeds while reducing accidents due to human error. Recent research in automated lateral control has focused on vehicle control during low-g maneuvers. To increase safety, automated lateral controllers will need to recognize and react to emergency situations.

This paper investigates the effects of vehicle and tire model order on the response of automated vehicles to an emergency step lane change using a controller based on linear vehicle and tire models. From these studies it is concluded that control strategies based solely on linear vehicle and tire models are inadequate for emergency vehicle maneuvers.

A strategy is then proposed to automatically control vehicles through emergency maneuvers. Here the response of a nonlinear vehicle model is used with a linear state model to optimize controller gains for nonlinear maneuvers. An emergency step lane change is used as a preliminary test of the method.     

Effect of Traction Force Distribution Control on Vehicle Dynamics

SUMMARY

The purpose of this study is to clarify vehicle dynamics effected by traction force distribution, not only between the front and rear wheels but also between the left and right wheels. Contribution of traction force distribution to vehicle turning performance was investigated using a mathematical simulation and an experimental vehicle. The results indicates that the control of traction control distribution between the left and right wheels greatly influences vehicle turning characteristics and improve the performance even in a marginal turning condition.     

Validation of an Articulated Vehicle Simulation

SUMMARY

Tests were performed on a typical UK articulated vehicle to measure dynamic tyre forces and sprung mass accelerations. The measured road profile data and vehicle response data are used to determine some of the important characteristics of articulated vehicle vibration behaviour. In particular, roll motions and their effect on dynamic tyre forces are examined. The measured data are used to validate two and three-dimensional computer models of the vehicle. Attention is given to modelling the tandem leaf-spring trailer suspension. The conditions under which a two-dimensional model can accurately simulate vehicle behaviour are examined.     

Adaptive Throttle Control for Speed Tracking

SUMMARY

Electronic throttle control is an important part of every advanced vehicle control system. In this paper we design an adaptive control scheme for electronic throttle that achieves good tracking of arbitrary constant speed commands in the presence of unknown disturbances. The design is based on a simplified linear vehicle model which is derived from a validated nonlinear one. The designed control scheme is simulated using the validated full order nonlinear vehicle model and tested on an actual vehicle. The simulation and vehicle test results are included in this paper to show the performance of the controller. Due to the learning capability of the adaptive control scheme, changes in the vehicle dynamics do not affect the performance of the controller in any significant manner.     

Vehicle Motion Analysis in Relation to Vehicle Safety

SUMMARY

The influence of vehicle handling on the possible avoidance of accident situations is discussed. lit is shown that accident reconstruction at present does not provide the necessary information to relate the cause of accidents to the lack of road worthiness of vehicles. It follows that the vehicle behavior in proximity of its performance limit must be determined in order to infer its accident avoidance potential.

The paper presents a review of the state-of-the-art of vehicle modeling, simulation of vehicle maneuvers and full scale testing. The application of the direct method of the stability theory is suggested as a possible means of obtaining performance limit envelopes which are necessary for establishing standards of the performance of vehicles.     

Dynamic Behaviour of Ore Wagons in Curves at Malmbanan

SUMMARY

The transportation of ore can be made more cost efficient by use of bigger and heavier trains. An increase in axle load is thereby wanted. The fleet of ore wagons of today at Malmbanan/Ofotbanan in northern Sweden and Norway has to be updated. It is of interest to find out if it is possible to allow a higher axle load on the track with new wagons

To be able to understand and predict the effects on track wear depending on what type of vehicle that is in use, the contact forces between wheels and rails have to be determined. A computer aided analysis has been made of the dynamic behaviour of three test vehicles equipped with different types of three-piece bogies running at Malmbanan. The vehicles are modelled and their interaction with the track is analysed using the multibody simulation package GENSYS

The simulations show that, even if the axle load is increased from 25 tons to 30 tons and the velocity is increased from 50 km/h to 60 km/h, it is possible to reduce lateral track forces and wear in curves by using a different bogie than the standard three-piece bogie used today.     

Optimal Design of Running Gears Part II. Applications

SUMMARY

In the second part of the paper applications are shown for the two-axle unsymmetric running gear and for symmetric running gears with two, three and four wheelsets.