Objectification of on-center handling characteristics based on spring-mass-damper system

As one of the major handling performance factors of vehicles and tires, on-center handling is very important at high speeds where safety and refinement are major concerns for the driver. In this paper, the steering wheel torque and vehicle response characteristics that play an important role in on-center handling performance were quantified using a spring-mass-damper (SMD) system. Using this system, the characteristics of steering wheel torque and vehicle response could be objectified with SMD parameters such as those for the spring and damping. Experimental objective tests were performed by considering the process by which the on-center handling is evaluated subjectively, and the SMD parameters were extracted from the measurement data. From a statistical analysis of the subjective and SMD parameters for several vehicles and professional drivers, it was found that the subjective assessment of on-center handling could be successfully explained using the suggested parameters.     

Coupled thermo-mechanical analysis and shape optimization for reducing uneven wear of brake pads

In vehicle braking systems, the non-uniform contact pressure distribution on the brake pad is a major cause of uneven wear. The experimental approach of the wear phenomenon is the time consuming and costly. For this reason, a threedimensional finite element (FE) model of a brake system is presented for numerical simulation in this paper. A coupled thermo-mechanical analysis is carried out to confirm the non-uniform contact pressure distribution. A correlation between the non-uniform contact pressure and uneven wear is confirmed by measuring the amount of wear in the brake pad. The shape optimization of the brake pad is performed to reduce the uneven wear. In addition, the simulation results, such as natural frequency and temperature, are compared to experimental results.     

An ERP approach for container terminal operating systems

The major characteristics of ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) are an enterprise-wide system that covers all the business functions and information resources, integrated database, built-in best industry practice, packaged software and open architecture. ERP enables reduction of system development time, flexibility, standardization of workflow and effective business planning capability. ERP is mainly for the manufacturing industry. However, the principles of ERP can also be applied to container terminal operating systems. This paper presents an ERP system approach for a container terminal. It has clustered the workflow of a container terminal and analysed the business process to generate the best workflows. The integrated database is designed to eliminate redundancy and keep integration. The core of ERP for container terminal is the planning facility such as berth planning and yard planning. The planning capability is very tightly coupled with data flow from client entities such as shipping companies. The ERP can handle the existing problems of container terminal operation that are mainly caused by lack of integration of a whole information resource in a container terminal, ad-hoc and poor planning capability, disconnected and incorrect data from client companies. The ERP approach can not only resolve the problems of container terminals but also promote adoption of information systems for container terminals in the world that have not yet implemented terminal operating systems.     

An Emergency Obstacle Avoidance Control Strategy for Automated Highway Vehicles

Summary This paper presents an emergency obstacle avoidance control strategy that may be used in automated highway vehicles. In the proposed control strategy, an inverse vehicle dynamics problem is solved on the selected emergency lane-change path to find out the nominal feedforward control inputs such as the steering wheel angle and the braking force. Then the overall vehicle lateral and yaw motion is controlled additionally in the feedback path by an active yaw moment for stability augmentation as well as a corrective steering angle that is added to the nominal steering angle in order to compensate for uncertainties involved in the nominal control input computation. The proposed control strategy has been tested by an ABS Hardware-In-the-Loop Simulation (HILS) system for rapid and safe control prototyping in a lab. Simulation results with a sample emergency avoidance distance (45 m) show that the proposed control strategy may be used as a feasible obstacle avoidance strategy for automated highway vehicles.     

High speed driving stability of passenger car under crosswind effects

The driving stability of a passenger car at high-speed and under crosswind conditions is affected by aerodynamic characteristics as well as their dynamic characteristics, suspension, and weight distribution. In this study, the total measuring system was thought up to understand the transient vehicle dynamics and aerodynamics with driver’s control inputs all together. The test results were taken from a full-scale wind tunnel test, a crosswind generator test and an on-road test. We investigated major aerodynamic parameters that affect the driving stability of passenger cars under crosswind effects such as overtaking, passing each other, natural crosswind, etc. The reaction rate of high-speed stability will be improved when we minimize the total lift, side force and especially the yawing moment.     

Parallel model based fault detection algorithm for electronic parking brake system

This paper describes a parallel model-based fault detection algorithm for an electronic parking brake (EPB) system, which consists of an electronic control unit with built-in current sensor and braking force sensor. For the EPB system to supply sufficient parking force to a vehicle, the parking force sensor is of utmost importance. If a fault occurs in this sensor, sufficient parking force may not be supplied, thereby seriously threatening the safety of the vehicle. Thus, a fault detection method is required for the parking force sensor of the EPB system to improve the safety of vehicles. For this purpose, a highly reliable fault detection method is needed to detect abnormal fault signals, which cannot be detected by the existing on-line sensor monitoring fault detection methods. This paper proposes a novel parallel model-based fault detection algorithm for the EPB system, which compares the physical sensor data with the mathematical model, the fuzzy model, and the neural network model at the same time. In order to reduce false alarms, the magnitude of thresholds and the operation counts are changed adaptively. When the proposed parallel model-based fault detection algorithm detects severe failures of the force sensor, it warns the driver in advance to prevent accidents due to the failures. The proposed algorithm is verified by hardware-in-theloop simulations in various situations.     

Innovative design optimization strategy for the automotive industry

In order to effectively solve modern automotive design problems including the results of nonlinear FEA and multi-body dynamics, a progressive meta-model based design optimization is presented. To reduce the number of initial sample points, two sampling methods are introduced. Then, for efficient and stable construction of meta-models, three metamodel methods are newly introduced which are numerically based on the singular value decomposition technique. To design a practical system considering manufacturing tolerances and optimizing multiple performances, a robust design optimization, 6-sigma constraints and multi-objective strategies are implemented when solving the approximate optimization problem constructed from the meta-models. Until the convergence criteria are satisfied, the initially developed meta-models are progressively improved by adding only one point that minimizes the approximate Lagrangian in the consecutive optimization iterations. Finally, one validation sample and four automotive applications are solved to show the effectiveness of the proposed approach.     

Co-operative control for regenerative braking and friction braking to increase energy recovery without wheel lock

This paper presents a regenerative braking co-operative control algorithm to increase energy recovery without wheel lock. Considering the magnitude of the braking force available between the tire and road surface, the control algorithm was designed for the regenerative braking force at the front wheel and friction braking force at the rear wheel to be increased following the friction coefficient line. The performance of the proposed regenerative braking co-operative control algorithm was evaluated by the hardware in the loop simulation (HILS) with an electronic wedge brake on its front wheels and an electronic mechanical brake on its rear wheels. The HILS results showed that a proper braking force on the front and rear wheels on a low μ road prevented the lock of the front wheels that was connected to the motor, and maintained the regenerative braking and increased energy recovery.