Dynamics and Control

Our Dynamics & Control group focuses on vehicle motion control to enhance vehicle safety, performance and comfort. The research is supported by various simulation models, driving simulators and experimental test vehicle platforms.

The main application domains are:

Vehicle active safety using new sensor information

  • SAE Level 1-3: driver support in critical driving situations
  • SAE Level 2-4: force-based emergency path following

The current sensor set used in estimation of tire-ground interaction is insufficient for robust real-time predicting the tire forces and moments. The concept of “intelligent bearing” was developed in Delft University of Technology in the collaboration with bearing manufacturer SKF. The technique allows an accurate reconstruction of tire forces and moments from bearing strains in the frequency range up to 10Hz, which is sufficient for vehicle handling control. The reconstructed forces and moments can be used as additional information to improve state estimation as well as a pure force-based observer removing tire model.

Kerst Stijn, Barys Shyrokau, and Edward Holweg. “Reconstruction of wheel forces using an intelligent bearing.” SAE International Journal of Passenger Cars-Electronic and Electrical Systems, 9, 2016-01-0092 (2016): 196-203.

Kerst Stijn, Barys Shyrokau, and Edward Holweg. “A semi-analytical bearing model considering outer race flexibility for model based bearing load monitoring.” Mechanical Systems and Signal Processing 104 (2018): 384-397.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B-gkfKZXAwU

Comfortable and pleasant driving

  • SAE Level 2-3: enhanced steering feel & transitions
  • SAE Level 2-4: comfort as a part of motion planning & control

Safety is a key priority in the current development of automated driving cars. In the same time, motion perception with automated driving is next on the roadmap. Due to the paradigm shift of a driver role from Level 3 AD to Level 4 AD, low frequency vibrations could cause motion sickness. In addition, visual and vestibular cues can be incongruent especially during abrupt automatic driving maneuvers, which might result in discomfort or even in a panic reaction. Techniques to predict such effects and incorporate these in the vehicle control are weak-investigated due to their complexity requiring knowledge fusion in biomechanical, automotive and control engineering domains.

 

Industrial collaboration: Rapid prototyping

  • SAE Level 2+: recreation of steering feel and assist evaluation
  • SAE Level 2+: comfort evaluation in a driving simulator

The testing of automated vehicles requires expensive test programs (e.g., 14.2 billion kilometres according to Toyota research), which cannot be achieved without involvement of new simulation techniques. Also, non-standard driving situations during evasive and emergency maneuvers are hard to test from the points of safety and repeatability. Using driving simulator technology and systematic methodology to evaluate driver acceptance and comfort using driving simulator technology, the potential misalignments between control strategies of an automated vehicle and driver/passenger behavior can be investigated in a safe and controllable environment.